NEWS BRIEFS

Milpitas, CALIF. — Quantum Corporation’s Hard Disk Drive Group announced the formation of its new Advanced Development Labs (ADL) – an organization dedicated to creating the next breakthrough technologies for Quantum’s hard disk drive business.

Work in the ADL will focus first on promising early stage technologies for future hard disk drive products. However, the ADL will also engage in activities with the potential to further diversify Quantum’s business through innovations in home networking, digital entertainment technologies, home servers, set-top boxes, audio/video file management, encryption, storage systems and software. Quantum is investing in its new labs above and beyond its normal funding for product development.

“We’ve broadened our research and development interests from just strictly hard disk drives that go into desktop computers and servers to consider a wide array of new markets where cutting-edge hard drive technologies can make a significant contribution,” said Bernie Huth, Quantum’s vice president of technology and engineering and chief technology officer. “Quantum’s ADL initiatives will also focus on anticipating the future technology needs and issues of our customers.”

The formation of Quantum’s ADL is both timely and relevant due to changing forces affecting the current hard drive market. Today, with high reliability and low cost, the hard disk drive finds itself at the core of a variety of new products and business models being introduced. For example, Quantum QuickView hard drive technologies helped create the new category of Personal Video Recorders (PVRs) from TiVo and Replay, which analysts predict will grow to eight million units by 2003. The objective of the scientists and engineers inside Quantum’s ADL is to develop promising new technologies, from within its own labs and through external relationships, with the potential of reaching the market in three to five years.

“The work inside the ADL represents a strategic, proactive outlook for Quantum in which we are charting our own course for technology developments,” Huth said. “We are concentrating on staying ahead of the technology curve and serving as agents for change in the hard drive industry. The ADL will be the catalyst for stimulating and driving innovation needed to keep Quantum’s business healthy and growing. As we investigate, refine and shape new ideas, we can form the beginnings of new products, systems and processes so Quantum continues to build upon its current, strong market standing.”

Located in Milpitas, California and Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, the ADL is currently staffed by 60 employees. The group’s charter also includes assessing storage trends, developing technology strategies and collaborating with major university research programs in storage such as those at Carnegie Mellon, UC San Diego, UC Berkeley and Stanford. Quantum also works closely with industrial groups including the National Storage Industry Consortium (NSIC). Quantum is a charter member of NSIC, which was founded in 1991 to promote joint research among industry, universities and government labs for advanced information storage technology.

“Quantum has consistently been a major supporter of the NSIC and our collaborative programs aimed at pushing the leading edge of research in the hard disk drive technology,” said Dr. Paul D. Frank, executive director of NSIC. “NSIC is pleased to see Quantum’s further increase in emphasis on hard disk drive technology and applications through creation of the ADL organization.”

The ADL will also sponsor internal programs for Quantum’s engineering and scientific community such as the Inventor of the Year Award, the Quantum Fellows Program, and the Technical Liaison Council.

Founded in 1980, Quantum Corporation ( http://www.quantum.com ) is the world’s leading storage supplier in six of the seven markets it serves: desktop hard disk drives, tape drives, network attached storage (NAS) appliances, solid state systems, hard disk drive appliances for consumer electronics and DLTtape automation systems. Quantum is also a leading supplier of high-end hard disk drives. In 1999 Quantum became the first Silicon Valley company to issue tracking stock, replacing its existing common stock with the ticker symbols DSS and HDD, which track the separate performance of the company’s DLT and Storage Systems and Hard Disk Drive businesses. Both stocks are traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Selling its products through OEM and distribution channels worldwide, Quantum’s sales for the fiscal year ending March 2000 were $1.4 billion for Quantum’s DLT and Storage Systems Group and $3.3 billion for Quantum’s Hard Disk Drive Group.

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