St. Paul, Minn. (May 10,1995) -- Plans for Travan™ minicartridge technology to meet end user data storage needs ranging from desktop through enterprise systems were strengthened today when Exabyte Corp., Boulder, Colo., joined 3M in supporting that technology.

Exabyte plans to manufacture and market midrange and high-end minicartridge tape drives using the Travan platform. The products will be based on a unique drive/minicartridge interface included in a patent application filed by 3M.

The Travan migration path for the new drive and minicartridge products should exceed 15 gigabytes (GB) of uncompressed storage capacity by 1997, according to 3M.

"The benefit of Travan technology is that it has the potential to be standardized across all market segments, from the desktop to the midrange to the enterprise," said Ernie Wassmann, Exabyte's vice president of marketing.

"Exabyte's endorsement is particularly noteworthy because it positions Travan technology in the performance segments of the market," said Michael Stevens, business development director, 3M Data Storage Tape Technology Division. "Exabyte's demonstrated leadership in high performance tape storage and automation will certainly accelerate the acceptance of Travan technology."

"As acceptance of Travan technology increases across all market segments, there will be a need for storage automation capabilities," Wassmann added. "As the industry leader in automated tape libraries, Exabyte will offer our expertise in both high performance tape drive and reliable storage automation solutions."

"This announcement is further indication of the broad-based support that exists for Travan technology," said Stevens. "Since Exabyte is a leader in high capacity, high performance tape technologies, the company's participation in this program is a strong endorsement of the Travan roadmap."

3M, Exabyte and other licensees of the Travan technology are investigating advanced media formulations, track-density improvements, and high speed computer interfaces to enable high capacity increases with the Travan platform, said Stevens. 3M also is participating in new software co-development alliances that will transform the role of tape on the desktop and further enhance Travan technology's role in the local area network (LAN) environment.

Optimized Minicartridge Platform
The initial points along the Travan migration path will include a modified version of QIC-80, 3010 and 3020 recording formats that accept the new cartridge.

3M recently announced availability of its TR-1 minicartridge, the first in a series of new high capacity tape products that the company plans to introduce this year. The TR-1 minicartridge provides users with 400 MB of uncompressed storage capacity, more than doubling the capacity of the industry's top-selling QIC-80 minicartridge (currently 125 MB).

The uncompressed storage capacity of the TR-2 minicartridge, a new modified 3010 drive/cartridge, is expected to be 800 MB (now 340 MB). The capacity of the TR-3 minicartridge, a new modified 3020 drive/cartridge, is expected to be 1.6 GB (now 670 MB). 3M also plans to introduce its TR-4 minicartridge in 1995 with a capacity of 4 GB. The industry is currently defining the TR-5 at approximately 10 GB.

The Travan platform will optimize available space in a 3.5-inch drive form factor housing. Mechanical changes will enable the drive to accept current QIC minicartridges, QIC-Wide and Travan cartridges. The new cartridge will contain 750 feet of .315-inch media. The initial Travan cartridge offerings will require no changes in media formulation, and will use existing drive electronics and available head technology.

Recently, Hewlett Packard's Colorado Memory Systems Division, Conner Peripherals and 3M announced tape products based on the Travan platform. In addition, Iomega, Rexon, Sony, Pertec Memories and AIWA have announced plans to develop products incorporating Travan technology.

Headquartered in Boulder, Colo., Exabyte Corp. designs, manufactures and markets a full range of tape storage products: 8mm, 4mm and quarter-inch minicartridge tape drives, tape libraries and recording media. Exabyte is the world's largest independent manufacturer focused solely on tape storage products, which it ships to original equipment manufacturers, value-added resellers and distributors. For Exabyte product information: in North America call 1-800-EXABYTE, in Europe call 31-3403-51-347, and in Asia call 65-271-6331.

Data cartridge technology, invented and patented by 3M, is the world's most popular desktop tape backup technology and boasts an installed base of more than 11 million drives, with three million drives shipped in 1994 alone.

3M is the world's largest supplier of branded minicartridges.

Travan is a trademark of 3M.
QIC-Wide is a trademark of Sony.
Windows is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation.

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