Western Digital Corporation and SanDisk Corporation today announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Western Digital will acquire all of the outstanding shares of SanDisk for a combination of cash and stock. The offer values SanDisk common stock at $86.50 per share or a total equity value of approximately $19 billion, using a five-day volume weighted average price ending on October 20, 2015 of $79.60 per share of Western Digital common stock. If the previously announced investment in Western Digital by Unisplendour Corporation Limited closes prior to this acquisition, Western Digital will pay $85.10 per share in cash and 0.0176 shares of Western Digital common stock per share of SanDisk common stock; and if the Unisplendour transaction has not closed or has been terminated, $67.50 in cash and 0.2387 shares of Western Digital common stock per share of SanDisk common stock. The transaction has been approved by the boards of directors of both companies.

The combination is the next step in the transformation of Western Digital into a storage solutions company with global scale, extensive product and technology assets, and deep expertise in non-volatile memory (NVM). With this transaction, Western Digital will double its addressable market and expand its participation in higher-growth segments. SanDisk brings a 27-year history of innovation and expertise in NVM, systems solutions and manufacturing. The combination also enables Western Digital to vertically integrate into NAND, securing long-term access to solid state technology at lower cost.

The Storage Products Business Unit of Toshiba America Electronic Components, Inc., a committed technology leader, announces its newest enterprise performance hard disk drive (HDD) line, the AL14SE series, designed for mission critical servers and high-performance, high-availability storage systems. The AL14SE is Toshiba’s latest 10,500 rotations per minute (RPM) HDD to support 12Gbit/s SAS and 512n sector length for compatibility with the latest generation host controllers and host bus adapters.

The AL14SE features a new four platter design, increasing storage capacity by 33 percent over the previous AL13SE generation models. The new AL14SE family is also updated with a 128MB data buffer for improved performance. The AL14SE family of HDDs provides 12Gbit/s dual-ported SAS support and 512n sector models in industry standard capacities of 300GB, 450GB, 600GB, 900GB and 1200GB.

ZOTAC International, a global innovator and leading manufacturer of graphics cards, ZBOX Mini PCs, and Solid State Drives (SSDs), ramps up a new line of storage aimed at offering enduring speed in desktops, notebooks, and external storage as it becomes an essential to every PC. 

Available in 240GB and 480GB capacities, the Premium Edition SSDs bring with it a suite of features. At the heart sits a quad-core Phison SSD controller and outstanding MLC NAND for marathon reliability with up to 480 TBW and up to 3,000 PE cycles. With robust performance delivering sequential read/write speeds of up to 520MBps and 500MBps, the Premium Edition SSDs are within a hair’s width of the SATA III bandwidth saturation point.

OCZ Storage Solutions -- a Toshiba Group Company and provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced the introduction of Host Managed SSD (HMS) technology, first supported by the Saber 1000 Series SSDs. HMS technology enables Host controls over internal SSD background processing tasks that were previously not exposed to host-level software. System-level software control of background processing tasks, such as Garbage Collection, enable improving overall storage performance, and specifically enable obtaining consistent and predictable latency across a large pool of SSDs.

Hyperscale, Cloud, and datacenters now run software defined storage applications which manage large pools of SSDs across multiple servers. Consistent performance of these SSDs is critical to many modern applications, such as modern data bases and online trading, that have migrated to the Cloud. Exposing HMS functions via API enables integration of HMS functions into the storage stacks.

Lexar, a leading global brand of flash memory products, today announced two additions to its CFast memory card line: the Lexar Professional 3600x CFast 2.0 card and the Lexar Professional 3500x CFast 2.0 card. Both are designed to capture high-quality 4K video and meet the exacting speed and capacity demands of professional cinematographers, filmmakers, and content creators. These cards leverage new thresholds of performance and maximize the capabilities of next-generation cinema-grade video cameras.

“More and more cinematographers and videographers are embracing cutting-edge video cameras for important shoots,” said Steffi Ho, product marketing manager, Lexar. “The goal in developing the Professional 3600x and 3500x CFast 2.0 cards is to provide them with the fastest memory cards available to capture high quality 4K video and beyond.”

Lexar, a leading global brand of flash memory products, today announced two additions to its mobile USB 3.0 flash drive line: the Lexar JumpDrive M20c and the Lexar JumpDrive M20i. The Lexar JumpDrive M20c is designed for use with next-generation USB Type-C devices, and features two connectors – USB Type-C and USB 3.0 – to allow users to easily share content between smartphones, tablets, and computers. The Lexar JumpDrive M20i is designed for use with iOS devices, enabling users to easily offload and move photos and videos between an iPhone, iPad, and computers.

"The long-awaited reality of Type-C connectivity is here, and the new Lexar JumpDrive M20c is meeting the emerging demand for a solution that allows users to quickly and easily share content across next-generation and legacy devices," said Aaron Lee, director of product marketing, Lexar. "With the endless amount of content being created, captured, and consumed every day, it's easy to run out of space on your smartphone or tablet. Both the Lexar JumpDrive M20c and Lexar JumpDrive M20i provide users with an easy way to transfer, share, and offload content on the go."

Lexar, a leading global brand of flash memory products, today announced the 128GB capacity of the Professional 2000x SDXC UHS-II memory card. Available for purchase later this year, the 128GB Lexar Professional 2000x SDXC UHS-II card will be the fastest UHS-II memory card available at this capacity on the market.

Leveraging the Ultra High Speed II, UHS Speed Class 3 (U3) specification, the Lexar Professional 2000x SDXC card quickly captures and transfers extended lengths of 4K, 1080p full-HD, and 3D video, as well as high-quality images. The new 128GB capacity card offers read transfer speeds up to 300MB per second and write speeds up to 260MB per second. Additionally, the Professional 2000x SDXC UHS-II card includes an SD UHS-II reader for high-speed file transfer of photos and videos from the card to any PC or Mac® system, dramatically accelerating workflow and offering users immediate performance right out of the package.