Processors Toolkit

SanDisk chief flashes forward to phones

Tags:
Nokia,
Mobile Phone,
Mobile Phones,
Founder

Tom Krazit and Charles Cooper CNET News

Published: 03 Sep 2007 16:11 BST

...would be wireless connected to everything else and therefore the distinction between a mobile phone or an MP3 player is going to be somewhat blurred.

It's very difficult for me to see us trying to out-Nokia Nokia. Nokia certainly is a very good customer of ours, but where we can add value to Nokia or to Sony Ericsson or to Motorola or Samsung is to add value to make their phones more attractive. That would be our inclination.

Can you help us understand strategically how far you see yourselves going upstream? Give us a broader understanding of what you think the company should aim at, where do you see it evolving?
First of all, we are absolutely focused on mobile platform. The mobile platforms that we're talking about are all moving to very intelligent devices that are wireless to communicate with each other.

Basically, the iPhone really is a computer in disguise and the smartphones are computers. There's no question that again in the next two to three years there would be a plethora of smart devices that are handheld and battery-operated where they need a lot of storage and the only solution is flash memory.

What role will software play? One of Apple's advantages (over other MP3 player makers) is that it controls the software that goes with its devices.
With due respect to Microsoft, they clearly are not on the cutting edge of either innovation or efficiency. Apple definitely has an advantage over there and certainly they're taking advantage of that.

But it's a 700MB operating system in the iPhone and really it needs to be much, much more. A much more efficient operating system that probably is free is Linux, and that's really where you're going to see a tremendous amount of innovation.

The biggest threat to Microsoft is not the Apple operating system but rather Linux

Apple has an advantage in terms of near-term, but frankly they have a major disadvantage in that they reject and repel other people's ideas and other people's applications. That will eventually be to their detriment because they just don't have enough time in the world to invent everything and do it better than everybody else.

Are you are looking at some sort of Linux-based software to run on your future devices?
No, I'm not saying that. The biggest threat to Microsoft is not the Apple operating system but rather Linux. It's very difficult to beat free, and consumer electronics always gravitates towards the closest thing to free.

Eli, you saw the announcement last week by Seagate getting into the flash market. How does that impact SanDisk?
It's great, I think Seagate is very smart. In 1988 or 1989 when I was visiting Kodak, they had flash technology and digital film but really wanted it to go away, they basically wanted to shove it under the carpet. Seagate is not doing that. They're saying this is a real technology and we're going to be a player in that.

How do you think that will change the development of hybrid hard drives?
Hybrid disk drives have so far not been very successful because they're dogs. They've tried to cut to a minimum the flash memory in the disk drive. It's a catch-22, they put in too little flash and therefore they're not getting the performance, therefore they can't charge more for it, and therefore they've got to use less of it.

The way to do it is to say: "What's the minimum that they really do need to get a very, very marked performance improvement?" And that's what I've got to start with. It doesn't have to be, say, 2GB, but it's not 1GB either.

You're the founder of the company and you've been chief executive since, what 1988? How much longer are you going to be at this?
As far as I'm concerned, so long as I'm having fun I'm OK, as long as I can contribute and help the team. We are very, very early in our development as a major corporation and we have some really exciting stuff in the years ahead. So I'm still good. I still have a lot of energy and I have an incredible team that makes it possible for me to have a lot of fun.