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Verbatim continues its push in Flash memory with this tiny and tough USB drive

You’d be surprised what an old storage company like Verbatim – which started by selling data cassettes 40-years ago – can bring to the rapidly changing flash memory market.

For Mark Rogers, the company’s marketing manager for its 6-year old Flash business, it’s all about:

1. Lifetime warranty on all Flash products (both cards and USB drives); replacing any faulty devices, no questions ask. Kingston also offers a lifetime warranty on its Flash memory cards, but only 5-years for its USB drives; for Sandisk its 2-years and just 1-year for PNY;
2. A standard password protection feature (for Windows only, not Macs) available on most of Verbatim drives;
3. Enough performance to speed up Windows, thanks to the USB keys “ReadyBoost” compatibility;

And in conjunction with this week Flash Memory Summit in Santa Clara, Calif., Verbatim introduced new USB keys – the TUFF-’N'-TINY line – that are among the smallest and sturdiest in the market.

Mobile phones are main driver of Flash memory cards sales

However, despite being the fourth top selling brand of USB flash drives in the U.S., Verbatim is yet to ship a solid-state drive (SSD) that would compete with the likes of Intel/Kingston, STEC, etc.

“But we’re in the process of launching an ExpressCard SSD [announced at the Consumer Electronics Show last January and already shipping in Europe] which is based on a removable form-factor. Verbatim is in the removable media business and we chose to start our entry in SSD in that manner ,” said Rogers.

More on our exclusive interview with Verbatim in the video below:

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 12th, 2009 at 8:36 pm and is filed under chips, computers, hardware, interview, news. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.