SanDisk

SanDisk (until 1995 SunDisk) is an American multinational computer technology corporation for flash memory products, including memory cards and readers, USB flash drives, solid-state drives, and digital audio players, manufactured and marketed by Western Digital. The original company, SanDisk Corporation was acquired by Western Digital in 2016.

SanDisk
FormerlySanDisk
TypeBrand
IndustryStorage devices
Founded1988 (1988)
FoundersEli Harari
Sanjay Mehrotra
Jack Yuan
Headquarters
Milpitas, California
,
United States
Products
Number of employees
Increase 8,790
ParentWestern Digital
Websitewww.westerndigital.com/brand/sandisk

As of March 2019, Western Digital was the fourth-largest manufacturer of flash memory having declined from third-largest in 2014.[1]

History
SanDisk founders: Jack Yuan, Eli Harari, and Sanjay Mehrotra (2010)

SanDisk was founded in 1988 by Eli Harari, Sanjay Mehrotra, and Jack Yuan.[2] SanDisk co-founder Eli Harari developed the Floating Gate EEPROM which proved the practicality, reliability and endurance of semiconductor-based data storage.[3]

In 1991 SanDisk produced the first flash-based solid-state drive (SSD) in a 2.5-inch hard disk drive form factor for IBM with a 20 MB capacity priced at about $1,000.[4]

In 1992, SanDisk introduced FlashDisk, a series of memory cards made for the PCMCIA or PC card form factor, so they could be inserted into the expansion slots of many laptops and handheld PCs of the time. Unlike other similar products at the time, FlashDisks did not require a battery to store their contents. SanDisk discontinued their production in 2002, and the highest capacity model had 8 gigabytes of capacity.[5]

In 1995, just before its initial public offering, SunDisk changed its name to SanDisk, to avoid confusion with Sun Microsystems, a prominent computer manufacturer at the time.[5]

On May 10, 2000, the Toshiba Corporation of Japan and the SanDisk Corporation said that they would jointly form a new semiconductor company to produce advanced flash memory, primarily for digital cameras.[6]

In 2005 SanDisk entered the digital audio player market with the release of its first flash-based MP3 player, the SanDisk Sansa e100.[7] As soon as 2006, they became the second largest maker of digital audio players in the United States behind Apple.[8]

Acquisitions and growth
  • In October 2005, SanDisk acquired Matrix Semiconductor.[9]
  • In July 2006, SanDisk acquired M-Systems.[10]
  • In May 2011, SanDisk acquired Pliant Technology, a manufacturer of solid state drives, for US$327 million.[11]
  • In February 2012, SanDisk acquired FlashSoft.[12]
  • In June 2012, SanDisk acquired Schooner Information Technology, developer of the flash-optimized database software SchoonerSQL and caching software Membrain.[12]
  • In July 2013, SanDisk acquired SMART Storage Systems, a producer of SSDs for the enterprise market, for US$307 million.[13]
  • In June 2014, SanDisk acquired Fusion-io, a producer of flash memory for enterprise data centers, for $1.1 billion.[14]

Awards and sale

In 2012, the Enough Project ranked SanDisk the third highest of 24 consumer electronics companies on "progress on conflict minerals".[15]

In 2014, SanDisk co-founder Harari won the National Medal of Technology and Innovation from President Barack Obama for his innovations and contributions to flash memory storage.[16]

On January 8, 2015, NexGen Storage, which had been acquired by Fusion-io, was spun out to become an independent company once again.[17] In January 2016, Pivot3 (based in Austin, Texas) acquired NexGen Storage.[18] SanDisk was acquired by hard disk drive manufacturer Western Digital on May 12, 2016, for US$19 billion.[19][20]

In 2019 Sanjay Mehrotra received a lifetime achievement award at a trade show.[21]

See also

References
  1. "Market View: NAND Flash Brand Supplier Revenue Falls 6.6% in First Quarter". DRAMeXchange. February 5, 2015. Retrieved July 23, 2015.
  2. Harris, Scott Duke (July 13, 2008). "Mercury News interview: SanDisk CEO helped launch digital revolution". The San Jose Mercury News. Retrieved August 6, 2008.
  3. "Santa Clara Valley Chapter Meeting: 'Future Directions for Semiconductor Non-Volatile Memory". Santa Clara University: IEEE Electron Devices Society. January 16, 1990.
  4. "A History of Innovation". Western Digital. 1991. Retrieved March 28, 2019.
  5. "25 Years of CompactFlash: A Look Back at the Pioneering Format". PCMAG.
  6. "Toshiba and SanDisk Enter Joint Venture". The New York Times. Reuters. May 10, 2000. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  7. "New SanDisk Sansa Mp3 Players". phys.org.
  8. Wingfield, Nick (August 21, 2006). "SanDisk Raises Music-Player Stakes". Wall Street Journal.
  9. Kawamoto, Dawn (October 21, 2005). "SanDisk to acquire Matrix Semiconductor". CNET. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
  10. "SanDisk To Buy msystems". The Street. July 31, 2006. Archived from the original on September 30, 2007. Retrieved August 21, 2006.
  11. Kovar, Joseph F. (May 16, 2011). "SanDisk Plans To Buy SSD Maker Pliant Technology". CRN.com. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
  12. Kovar, Joseph F. (June 27, 2012). "SanDisk Buys Schooner, Moves Into Enterprise Software Space". CRN.com. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
  13. Dignan, Larry (July 2, 2013). "SanDisk acquires SMART Storage Systems for $307 million". ZDNet. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
  14. Hesseldahl, Arik (June 16, 2014). "SanDisk to Acquire Troubled Fusion-io for $1.2 Billion". Recode. Vox Media. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
  15. Lezhnev, Sasha; Hellmuth, Alex (August 2012). "Taking Conflict Out of Consumer Gadgets: Company Rankings on Conflict Minerals 2012" (PDF). Enough Project. Retrieved August 17, 2012.
  16. Fairsmith, Christine (October 24, 2014). "Eli Harari *73 receives honor from President Obama". School of Engineering and Applied Science. Princeton University. Retrieved July 24, 2019.
  17. "SanDisk Completes Spin-Out of the Company's ioControl Solutions Business". Press release. SanDisk. January 8, 2015. Retrieved November 21, 2016.
  18. Joseph F. Kovar (January 27, 2016). "Pivot3 To Acquire NexGen Storage, Bring Storage QoS To Hyper-Converged Infrastructure". CRN. Retrieved February 16, 2022.
  19. Molina, Brett (October 21, 2015). "Western Digital to acquire SanDisk for $19B". USA TODAY. Retrieved October 22, 2015.
  20. Vincent, James (May 12, 2016). "Western Digital Officially Closes SanDisk Acquisition". The Verge. Vox Media. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
  21. "Flash Memory Lifetime Achievement Award 2019 - Sanjay Mehrotra". flashmemorysummit.com. Retrieved January 13, 2021.
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