Sandisk shrugs off recession woes

RECENTLY AT MWC, the INQ caught up with Sandisk and talked to the firm about its latest memory offerings and its plans to weather the economic crisis.

"We feel that Sandisk as a company is well positioned not only to ride this economic downturn out but also then be in a position to grow as the markets come back," noted Mike Wong, the firm's Director of Public Relations.

Wong noted Sandisk was the only firm currently offering a 30MB per second SD card and that it was already well placed to move up from its current high capacity 32GB card. The firm was also showing off its new video HD card offerings, memory sticks for professional cameras and flash memory 'micro-cards' which it hopes will replace CDs and offer an alternative to MP3s.

Noting that Sandisk had been in the memory business for over 20 years, Wong said, "Most people don't recognise we are the company who invented the compact flash card and all of the basic technology".

Wong told the INQ Sandisk's new X3 and X4 process technologies were "very significant" to the firm as they would now start rolling out into most of its existing product lines.

"That's actually our third generation of X3 technology within an 18-month period, so it shows how fast we're adopting those new technologies," said Wong of the three-bits-per-cell X3 built on a 32nm process. He added it was also significant because the move would eventually enable the company to build a 32GB micro SD card, but cautioned, "Just because we have that capability doesn't mean we're going to build that card right away."

Wong reckoned Sandisk's would be the fastest 30nm class process technology on the market, giving the firm an advantage over its competitors.

As for X4, four-bits-per-cell at 43nm, the new tech means Sandisk can actually build a 64 gigabit chip on a single die, which Wong says will eventually lead to a 64GB CF card, but not a 64GB Micro SD card in the foreseeable future.

Both bits of tech will make the larger capacity cards feasible in the not-too-distant-future, but Sandisk is more concerned with lowering its production costs than growing its card capacity at the moment.

Remarking Sandisk really needed to lower its manufacturing costs with tech like the X3 and X4 because of the pricing drop which has crippled the market over the past three years, Wong noted, "When pricing drops faster than costs drop, that's an issue for the industry". Consolidation between companies, said Wong, would also doubtless occur within the industry sooner rather than later.

Wong also admitted that the credit crunch was not exactly helping as Sandisk struggled to power on through an ailing memory market. "That's a completely different challenge, but a challenge none the less," he said.

Sensing that Wong was becoming terminally depressed by our line of questioning, we decided to veer the conversation towards SSDs, a topic which seemed to bring a glint to his eyes.

SSDs, Wong noted, were actually one of three strategic markets Sandisk was currently channelling its best energies (and remaining staff after axing 15 per cent of them back in November) into. The INQ was shown Sandisk's PSSD for the netbook market, a product which should be out by midyear in capacities of eight, 16, 32 and 64 Gigabytes. Sandisk's older, 2.5-inch SSDs will also be getting a revamp and cost cut, with versions coming out in 60, 120 and 240 GB for $149, $249 and $499 respectively by summer.

Admitting SSDs had suffered in the past due to their ridiculous costs, limited capacities and questionable performance, Wong optimistically said that this time around, "With the new products we're coming out with, we'll meet those three challenges."

Wong said Sandisk was now pricing its SSDs on parity with hard drives, had bumped up performance by a factor of five and was offering attractive capacities. Referring to the next couple of years, Wong said, "You'll look back at this time and say, 'Oh yeah, that's when they really started taking off'."

Of Sandisk's partnership with Toshiba, Wong noted the relationship was "key" because together the firms designed and manufactured both the NAND flash and the memory controller whereas other firms had to buy components ready made and assemble them. Getting things done in-house, said Wong, offered Sandisk, "the flexibility to do more with the designs".

Whatever lies ahead for the flash firm, Sandisk is certainly doing its best to ensure that it survives and won't just fade away like a bad memory. µ