Monday, May 07, 2007
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NOTE:
To read some very old (50 years old ! ) items,
scroll down to the bottom and click on
the word "STORIES."
However, if you're not interested in my old employers,
girlfriends, etc., just scroll down to see the Latest News
(the next item below).
===============================
NOTE:
To read some very old (50 years old ! ) items,
scroll down to the bottom and click on
the word "STORIES."
However, if you're not interested in my old employers,
girlfriends, etc., just scroll down to see the Latest News
(the next item below).
===============================
Wednesday, September 17, 2003
"MY MOST INTERESTING PROJECT"
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SUMMARY
Samsung Co. announced a revolutionary type of computer memory, which is expected
to become one of the world's main memory devices by year 2008. For the past 40 years,
this type of memory has slowly been improved by several companies. However, research
had only been continued for all those years, because I had previously patented some new
ideas in 1969, which proved that it was feasible (although expensive back in those days).
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What might turn out to be my most interesting and important research project was something I started working on in the 1960s. However, it required a long time to bear fruit. It now goes by the name "Phase Change Memory." A recent press release from Samsung Company predicts that this might become the main memory system for the world's computers in the near future. A news item about Intel Corp. predicts that this will become their new "flash memory" device, with vast numbers of applications (Electronic Engineering Times, March 12, 2007, page 20).
There is a great need for a cheap and rugged "memory diode" that does not require a lithium battery for memory retention. If there was such a thing, it would find tremendous usage (such as billions of them in each computer and cell phone), and it would be almost as important as the transistor itself.
An interesting person named Stan Ovshinsky invented such a memory diode about 50 years ago, and he got several patents on it. Wall Street investors became very excited, and Stan was featured on the front pages of the both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. Stan sold patent licenses to big companies such as ITT Corp., where I was then working as an engineer.
There was a problem: the wonderful little diodes allowed too many mistakes to creep into the memory, and thus they were actually useless. I was assigned to try and solve the reliability problem. Working days nights and weekends, I invented an electronic system that solved the problem. In the year 1969 I got U.S. Patents 3,448,302 and 3,448,425 on a reliable memory diode and its operating circuit, which you can see at www.uspto.gov. These patents were licensed for use by Ovshinsky.
My devices were not cheap enough for today's competitive world, but the Samsung Company continued the research project, under a license agreement with Ovshinsky. In September of 2006, Samsung demonstrated a large (512 MB) memory chip using a further improved version of the "Phase Change" ideas, although they said it might not be ready for sale until around 2008. Then Intel announced a similar ovonics-derived memory chip, to be made available around December 2007 (EE Times, March12, 2007, page20).
For further information, see a web page of Electronic Engineering Times magazine, by clicking on the word "News" below:
NEWS
Also, search the website www.wikipedia.org for "Phase Change Memory," and near the bottom of the page, see the quoted reference to licensing of the idea "to Samsung, from Ovonyx" (one of Ovshinsky's companies) in "Dec. 2005" and "Sept. 2006." Also search wikipedia for "Stan Ovshinsky," and see the statement there about my "U.S. patent 3,448,302," which provided the way for further work to be continued.
It will be quite satisfying to me when these ideas finally do bear fruit, possibly in a big way, a few years from now.
==========
OLD NEWS:
To read about my old employers, girlfriends, etc., (some were interesting people), click on the colored word below.
STORIES
==========
----------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------
SUMMARY
Samsung Co. announced a revolutionary type of computer memory, which is expected
to become one of the world's main memory devices by year 2008. For the past 40 years,
this type of memory has slowly been improved by several companies. However, research
had only been continued for all those years, because I had previously patented some new
ideas in 1969, which proved that it was feasible (although expensive back in those days).
----------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------
What might turn out to be my most interesting and important research project was something I started working on in the 1960s. However, it required a long time to bear fruit. It now goes by the name "Phase Change Memory." A recent press release from Samsung Company predicts that this might become the main memory system for the world's computers in the near future. A news item about Intel Corp. predicts that this will become their new "flash memory" device, with vast numbers of applications (Electronic Engineering Times, March 12, 2007, page 20).
There is a great need for a cheap and rugged "memory diode" that does not require a lithium battery for memory retention. If there was such a thing, it would find tremendous usage (such as billions of them in each computer and cell phone), and it would be almost as important as the transistor itself.
An interesting person named Stan Ovshinsky invented such a memory diode about 50 years ago, and he got several patents on it. Wall Street investors became very excited, and Stan was featured on the front pages of the both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. Stan sold patent licenses to big companies such as ITT Corp., where I was then working as an engineer.
There was a problem: the wonderful little diodes allowed too many mistakes to creep into the memory, and thus they were actually useless. I was assigned to try and solve the reliability problem. Working days nights and weekends, I invented an electronic system that solved the problem. In the year 1969 I got U.S. Patents 3,448,302 and 3,448,425 on a reliable memory diode and its operating circuit, which you can see at www.uspto.gov. These patents were licensed for use by Ovshinsky.
My devices were not cheap enough for today's competitive world, but the Samsung Company continued the research project, under a license agreement with Ovshinsky. In September of 2006, Samsung demonstrated a large (512 MB) memory chip using a further improved version of the "Phase Change" ideas, although they said it might not be ready for sale until around 2008. Then Intel announced a similar ovonics-derived memory chip, to be made available around December 2007 (EE Times, March12, 2007, page20).
For further information, see a web page of Electronic Engineering Times magazine, by clicking on the word "News" below:
NEWS
Also, search the website www.wikipedia.org for "Phase Change Memory," and near the bottom of the page, see the quoted reference to licensing of the idea "to Samsung, from Ovonyx" (one of Ovshinsky's companies) in "Dec. 2005" and "Sept. 2006." Also search wikipedia for "Stan Ovshinsky," and see the statement there about my "U.S. patent 3,448,302," which provided the way for further work to be continued.
It will be quite satisfying to me when these ideas finally do bear fruit, possibly in a big way, a few years from now.
==========
OLD NEWS:
To read about my old employers, girlfriends, etc., (some were interesting people), click on the colored word below.
STORIES
==========
