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SanDisk Corporation is
the global leader in flash memory cards, from research, manufacturing and
product design to consumer branding and retail distribution. |
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SanDisk's product portfolio
includes flash memory cards for mobile phones, digital cameras and camcorders;
digital audio/video players;
USB flash drives for
consumers and the enterprise; embedded memory for mobile devices; and
solid state drives for
computers. SanDisk is a Silicon Valley-based S&P 500 company, with more than
half its sales outside the United States.
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See also:-
SanDisk
- editor mentions on StorageSearch.com
.................SanDisk's SSD page - and
#SanDisk Enterprise | |
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Who's
who in SSD? - by
Zsolt Kerekes,
editor - May 2013
SanDisk (which has been a
top 10 SSD company
and was #18 in the Top
SSD Companies in Q1 2013) - is one of the leading company in advancing
the use of
advanced MLC
technology in SSDs (x3) continuing the thrust of technologies and market
ambitions which it inherited from it acquisition of SSD pioneer
M-Systems in 2006.
M-Systems was - at that time a credible leader in the enterprise
flash and military flash
SSD markets. For reasons best known to itself - SanDisk abandoned those
market toe-holds and instead focused on the consumer SSD market.
In
hindsight that was a serious business mistake because the
consumer
notebook SSD market in the first 5 years of its history (1996 to 2011)
didn't turn out to be the money spinner which companies like SanDisk and
Samsung had initially
hoped.
So at the start of
2011 -
SanDisk found itself in the unenviable position of having admirable flash
memory technology - but no enterprise technology worth a damn. SanDisk was at
the fuzzy end of the SSD market lollipop (consumer SSDs)
instead of the much sweeter and bigger market of
enterprise SSDs.
SanDisk made its first tactical move in that direction in May 2011
by acquiring
Pliant Technology.
Pliant had developed SAS
SSDs which used its own fast SSD controllers - but Pliant had been unable
to sell many due to the competiitive phenomenom of the
SandForce inside
market - which reshaped the competitive landscape in the
STEC- class enterprise
SSD market - and obsoleted the assumptions behind Pliant's business plans.
SanDisk
made its 2nd move into the enterprise SSD market in Februrary 2012 - by
acquiring an SSD software
company - FlashSoft.
Whether or not SanDisk manages to put in place in effective enterprise
marketing business still remains to be seen. Chipmakers which also make SSDs -
such as Micron and
Intel - don't really
understand the enterprise SSD market and how to cultivate new business in the
SSD industry.
Chipmakers (as opposed to systems companies) are used
to selling components... This means talking directly to the biggest computer
companies and hope that accounts for enough of the market. Leave the rest of
the business development to distributors. That design-slot stuffing method has
worked for over 30 years with evolutionary products like microprocessors and
memories - but doesn't work so well with revolutionary products like SSDs.
As we've seen in recent years - there are many big end users in the internet
economy which buy more SSDs than the big server oems - but who aren't on the
chipmakers' lists of traditional companies to call.
SanDisk was very
late entering PCIe SSD market - which is 1 of the
7 main market silos in
enterprise SSD architecture. (SanDisk launched its first enterprise PCIe
SSDs in June 2012.) So in that respect SanDisk was even further behind than
STEC - which entered the
PCIe SSD market in late
2011 and
SanDisk is 5-6 years behind the market leader
Fusion-io.
In
April 2013 - SanDisk's CEO confirmed that the company's PCIe SSD business had
been negligible upto that time. Instead most of SanDisk's enterprise sales were
still coming from SAS SSDs
and the product line based on its acquisition of Pliant.
SanDisk has
hundreds of SSD competitors .It's difficult enough for any single SSD company to
be successful and a leader in any of the major SSD markets. SanDisk's ambition
to be successful in both
consumer SSDs and
enterprise SSDs
is shared by competitor Micron.
SanDisk's
toughest competitor in the SAS
SSD market is SMART
- which sells these products to many oems including IBM - and like SanDisk has
world leading adaptive
flash controller technology.
SanDisk's companies to catch up with
in the PCIe SSD market
are Fusion-io,
Virident,
OCZ,
Micron, and
LSI.
SanDisk
is already a leader in the consumer SSD market. And its SSDs have also been
adopted for use in hybrid hard drives for the notebook market by WD and Fujitsu.
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In February 2009 SanDisk announced
that it will begin mass-production of the world's first 4-bits-per-cell (X4)
flash memory. Using 43nm process technology, this breakthrough enables 64Gb
memory in a single die - the highest capacity in the industry
In
May 2009 - SanDisk
started shipping its 2nd generation of
miniature
PATA compatible
SSD
modules for the netbook market. Performance is 9,000 vRPM and capacities
range from 8 to 64GB. SanDisk says it has improved the non volatile cache to
prevent "stalling" or "shuddering" which was a problem in
1st generation netbook SSDs.
Storage
clairvoyants, IDC,
project consumer purchases of netbooks to rise from 11.5 million sold in 2008 to
50 million in 2013.
27 companies make
miniature SSDs under 1.0"
in size. pSSD is simply a brand name of this SSD family from SanDisk -
and not new SSD jargon
term you need to know about. The traditional term for this type of product
is a DOM (disk on module). A SanDisk document describing the
1st
generation pSSD said the benefits were low cost and low weight - 1/10th
the weight of a typical 1.8"
HDD.
In
November 2009 - SanDisk
announced
that its 64GB
(9,000
vRPM) pSSD module has been selected as a standard SSD option in
Sony's
new VAIO X ultra-thin laptop.
In January 2010 -
SanDisk today
announced
results for the quarter ended January 3, 2010 - revenue of $1.24 billion
increased 44% on a year-over-year basis and increased 33% sequentially.
SanDisk's Chairman and CEO, Eli Harari, said the company had
achieved unit sales growth of 55% and gigabyte growth of 100% compared to the
year prior quarter.
In February 2010 -
SanDisk said it was
shipping
its G3 range of SSDs which had been preannounced in
January 2009 -
and originally expected to ship "in mid 2009."
In April
2010 - SanDisk
dropped out of StorageSearch.com's
top 10 SSD oems list
- and got its lowest ever ranking.
In May 2010 -
SanDisk started
sampling
netbook
SSD modules with upto 128GB capacity in the "mSATA mini"
form factor. SanDisk also started sampling 256GB models in its G4 notebook
SSD range.
In September 2010 -
SanDisk
announced
that NDS (a tv set top box designer with
with over 30 million DVR units deployed) has successfully has designed SanDisk
SSDs into a new range of lower cost set-top DVRs. The new solution allows
for the deployment of energy-efficient STBs with decreased power consumption,
small form factors and virtually silent operation.
In February 2011 -
SanDisk preannounced
details of a new miniature
SSD which will ship in Q3 2011 - the
iNAND
has upto 64GB (x3 MLC) capacity in a 12mm x 16mm x 1mm package.
In
May 2011
-
SanDisk acquired
Pliant Technology
for approximately $327 million.
In June 2011 -
SanDisk expanded its
Lightning
range (2.5"
and 3.5"
SAS
skinny flash
SSDs) which now offer upto 800GB MLC capacity. The new models are being
delivered for OEM qualification, and will be available via authorized channel
partners in Q3, 2011.
In July 2011 -
SanDisk was one of
several compatible companies named in
FlashSoft's launch of
its auto tiering SSD
software.
In February 2012 -
SanDisk
announced
it has acquired FlashSoft
- one of the leading independent software vendors in the
SSD ASAPs market.
In
June 2012 - SanDisk
launched a new family of bootable enterprise
PCIe SSDs with upto
400GB (MLC) capacity ($2,350 MSRP) - the
Lightning
- which leverages SSD IP from 2 previously acquired companies (Pliant for the
controller hardware and FlashSoft
for the auto caching
software).
In May 2013 -
SanDisk announced that
its iSSD
BGA form factor SATA
SSD was being used in a new 2.5"
hybrid for
notebooks
from WD. |
| . |
more articles you might be
interested in
MLC flash in
enterprise SSDs
what do
enterprise SSD users want?
Auto-tuning SSD Accelerated
Pools of storage
RAM SSDs versus Flash
SSDs - which is Best?
7 SSD types will satisfy all
future enterprise needs
Understanding what shapes
flash SSD performance
Efficiency - making the
same SSD - with less chips |
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| SanDisk
launches long awaited PCIe SSD accelerators |
Editor:- June 5, 2012 - SanDisk today launched
a new family of bootable enterprise
PCIe SSDs with upto
400GB (MLC) capacity ($2,350 MSRP) - the
Lightning
- which leverages SSD IP from 2 previously acquired companies (Pliant for the
controller hardware and FlashSoft
for the auto caching
software).
Upto 5 cards can be installed in a single system. |
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| new WD hybrid has SanDisk
iSSD inside |
| Editor:- May 7, 2013 - a new 2.5"
hybrid for
notebooks
from WD -
called WD Black
SSHD (500GB HDD
capacity, 5mm high SATA)
- has an iSSD
from SanDisk
inside - it was
announced
today. The iSSD has 9K/1K R/W IOPS performance and measures 16mm x
20mm x 1.2mm for capacities upto 16GB. Average power consumption is typically
55mW. | | |
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| Our PCIe SSD business is
negligible today - but we plan to change that - says SanDisk's CEO |
Editor:- April 18, 2013 - Nearly all SanDisk's
enterprise SSD
revenue still comes from SAS
SSDs - derived from their
acquisition of
Pliant in
March 2011 - and
the company's PCIe SSD revenue today is "negligibly small" but they
see PCIe SSDs as a
large market opportunity which they want to get into with products they will
launch in the 2nd half the year.
That was the gist of the message
from Sanjay
Mehrotra, cofounder and CEO SanDisk - in the company's earnings
conference call yesterday.
Other things which emerged:- SSDs are 20%
of SanDisk's sales this year, and like other
flash memory makers
SanDisk is reluctant to invest in new wafer fabs while there's still
uncertainty about the exact direction and proven viability of flash technology
beyond the current 2-3 years window. ...read
transcript on SeekingAlpha.com
PS - SanDisk
reported
that its revenue in the 1st calendar quarter of 2013 decreased 13% to
$1.34 billion from the preceding quarter, although this was 11% higher than the
year ago quarter.
Also in the same quarter - Q1 2013 - SanDisk
dropped 5 places in the
Top SSD Companies List. | | |
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| SanDisk invests in WhipTail |
| Editor:- December 13, 2012 - WhipTail today
announced
it has secured $31 million series C funding from a group of investors which
include SanDisk,
an unnamed "Silicon Valley industry titan" and some named private
equity companies and VCs.
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| SanDisk's
SSD revenue run rate passes $0.5 billion / year |
Editor:- October 18, 2012 - SanDisk today
reported
revenue of approx $1.3 billion for the quarter ended September 30.
Editor's
comments:- most of SanDisk's business is phone related flash - but here are
some useful SSD related points which emerged from the earnings conference call.
- The company declined to reveal the exact size of their SSD revenue but
said that SSDs are already more than 10% of SanDisk's revenue and they expect
to see strong growth in SSDs.
They're still at the early stages of
qualifying their enterprise PCIe SSD products. Nevertheless - in this quarter
- SanDisk's SSD business grew in both the consumer and enterprise markets.
- 50% of the company's overall product mix uses 19nm flash - and SanDisk is a
leader in TLC
(x3). They expect to use more TLC within SSDs.
- SanDisk said the integration of
SSD software within
their enterprise SSD business - which came from the acquisitions of
Schooner
Technology and FlashSoft
- is going well and is expected to add value. (This is particularly important
for the products they have in the
PCIe SSD and
SAS SSD markets.)
If
I extrapolate the clues from this quarter then SanDisk's SSD revenue run rate
has already passed $0.5 billion / year. So - unless something unexpectedly
bad happens with their enterprise SSD business - I wouldn't be surprised to see
a low end estimate of their total SSD revenue in calendar 2013 be in the range
of $600 to $700 million. | | |
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| FlashMAX is FlashSoft
compatible |
Editor:- August 27, 2012 - Virident's
PCIe SSDs are supported
by SanDisk's
FlashSoft
auto-caching software
- it was
announced
today.
The companies say this collaboration includes sales, joint
testing and validation programs, and support and services assistance.
Editor's
comments:- the thinking behind SanDisk's strategic decision to support
competing SSD hardware with its software was one of the things which I learned
in a recent interview with the company (August 15).
See
FlashSoft's profile page
for more details | | |
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