Sony and Zeon Develop New Hard Disk Material

Computergram International, August 13, 1999

Japanese consumer electronics giant Sony Corp and major chemical maker Nippon Zeon Company have joined forces to develop a synthetic resin hard disk substrate which they claim is an industry first. Production costs for synthetic resin substrates would be 30% to 40% lower than for conventional aluminium substrates, according to a Sony statement which said the companies plan to work with US hard disk equipment maker Castlewood Systems Inc to start commercial production of a drive using the synthetic substrate this year.

The disk will have a storage capacity of about 5GB, on a par with conventional drives using aluminium substrates, according to Sony and will initially be marketed for use in PCs. However the aim is to eventually sell it as a key component in home services which will control the operation of "intelligent" audio/visual appliances, the statement said. About 45 million hard disk substrates are shipped worldwide each month, 40 million of them aluminium and the rest made from glass substrates.