14 DAY TRIAL // An Israeli paper reports that Apple is very much interested in buying a fabless semiconductor company that specializes in flash storage in the country. The purchase price is said to be in the $400-$500 million range.
Tech news blogs and sites are pointing to a Calcalist report saying that the Cupertino company relying on NAND Flash storage for most of its products is now planning to enhance that feature even further by acquiring the IP of Anobit, an Israeli fabless semiconductor company.
The chip maker’s official web site reveals that “Anobit provides flash storage solutions for the Enterprise and Mobile markets.”
“It's [sic] MSP (Memory Signal Processing) technology significantly improves the endurance, performance and cost of flash storage products and systems. Anobit's products are used by world leading flash manufacturers, consumer electronics vendors and storage system providers,” reads the company’s about-us.
The Israeli report spreading this rumor says there is already evidence of Apple relying on Anobit technologies.
The company’s interest in the company stems from Anobit’s ability to improve long term reliability of NAND Flash cells, as well as to increase the actual storage amount per chip.
MacRumors dug up this Storage-Switzerland piece that details Anobit's methods. An excerpt from that article reads:
“Essentially this means they can detect flash problems in flash cells when they're much older, allowing them to extend the usable life of MLC flash significantly longer than other manufacturers. The net of this ability is Anobit's flash products have much longer endurance than comparable products from other vendors. They claim commercial-grade MLC endurance comparable to that of SLC flash from other manufacturers. Theoretically, this would enable users to replace SLC flash with the more economical MLC products.”
Apple is known for scooping up companies whose technological achievements go beyond the market’s expectations, one such example being Siri.
While $400 million would certainly mean a big investment, the payoff will be huge as it puts Apple in NAND Flash advantage, yet again.