Virtium

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Virtium Solid State Storage and Memory
Company typePrivately owned
IndustryTechnology
Founded1997; 27 years ago (1997)
HeadquartersRancho Santa Margarita, California
Key people
Phu Hoang, CEO; Chinh Nguyen, CTO Thomas Magee, CFO
ProductsFlash storage and DRAM memory modules
Number of employees
between 51 and 200
Websitewww.virtium.com

Virtium Solid State Storage and Memory (formerly known as Virtium Technology) is a privately held American company that manufactures semiconductor memory and solid-state disk (SSD) products for data storage in industrial/machine-to-machine designs, embedded systems, including small-footprint designs,[1] and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) applications.[2] The company's primary markets of focus include defense,[3] industrial systems, network communications, and transportation. The name Virtium is derived from the word virtue.

Description

Virtium was co-founded in 1997 by Phu Hoang, a refugee from Vietnam, and Chinh Nguyen. Hoang lived on a boat before immigrating to North America and learned English in a refugee camp.[4] Since co-founding Virtium, Hoang has been acknowledged for his entrepreneurship[5][6] and innovation.[7]

Headquartered in Rancho Santa Margarita, California, USA, and with operations elsewhere in North America, Europe and Asia, Virtium designs, builds and supports its products in the United States. Virtium's primary products are memory modules and solid-state drives that use flash storage and are designed primarily with the SATA and PCI Express interfaces.[8][9]

Virtium was among the first to apply proprietary programming sequences that “bridge” between single-level-cell (SLC) and multi-level-cell (MLC) types of flash memory used in SSDs, thus drawing on the reliability of the former and the cost efficiencies of the latter.[10] In 2016, Virtium introduced self-encrypting SSDs—the first family of industrial-grade SSDs with Advanced Encryption Standard (AES-256) self-encryption available across all major drive form factors and designed for data security and data integrity.[11] Those self-encrypting SSDs placed first in the Board, Modules & Embedded Systems category of the ECN magazine 2017 Impact Awards.[12] Also in 2016, Virtium became one of the first industry vendors to market eUSB 3.0 storage modules in the ultra-small, 10-pin form factor.[13] Later the same year, Virtium doubled the top capacity of its very-low-profile (VLP) RDIMM and Mini-RDIMM DDR4 memory modules to 64GB—at the time the highest capacity for industrial-embedded memory modules.[14] In early 2021, Virtium introduced three 32GB ultra-low-profile (ULP) DDR4 modules that represent the industry's first of that capacity in Mini-UDIMM, Mini-RDIMM and SO-UDIMM form factors, as well as the industry's first 64GB ULP RDIMM module.

In September 2017, Virtium debuted its StorFly M.2 NVMe SSDs that supported industrial temperatures, or I-Temp (−40 °C to +85 °C), and drew an industry-low 3 W of power.[15] In 2019, the company expanded its StorFly family of SSDs to include industrial 3D NAND-based drives,[16] followed by the StorFly-XR (XR is an initialism for "Extra Rugged") line of highly ruggedized SSDs using 3D NAND flash and XR-DIMM memory modules designed for military and aerospace applications.[17] Virtium expanded the StorFly family further in 2019 with the addition of a four-terabyte SSD with industrial-temperature support and integrated data protection.[18] In February 2020, the company brought to market its free StorKit SSD software suite for SSD qualification, migration from SLC and MLC to higher-density flash, and monitoring and maintenance of drives deployed locally or remotely.[19] Also in 2020, Virtium announced an expansion to the StorFly SSD family through the addition of higher-capacity 2.5-inch SATA, M.2 SATA and M.2 NVMe drives with I-Temp support.[20] To address the increasing role of industrial-grade storage in edge computing, Virtium collaborated with SolidRun later in 2020 to prequalify select Virtium SSDs, memory and SSD software for SolidRun computer-on-module and network computing platforms targeted at 5G communications systems.[21] In early 2021, Virtium further expanded its SSD family with the Series 6 line of NVMe, I-Temp-supported drives focused on data-intensive workloads[22] which was among Electronic Design magazine's Embedded Products and Solutions of the Week.[23] Storage-industry journalist and author Tom Coughlin illustrated the need for durable solid-state storage for industrial-embedded applications in a 2021 Forbes article, which featured Virtium, its SSDs and the drives' applications.[24] In May 2021, Virtium debuted the StorFly CFexpress PCIe Gen 4 Removable NVMe SSDs, the industry's first solid-state drives to incorporate NVMe, the PCI Express 4.0 interface and I-Temp in the highly compact CFexpress form factor.[25]

In August 2015, Virtium secured investment from L Squared Capital Partners[26] and added David Bradford and Tim Leyden to its board of directors. Court Square Capital Partners acquired L Squared Capital's investment in Virtium in May 2019.[27]

Products and specialization

Virtium specializes in memory modules, advanced components, flash-based solid-state drives (for local and remote storage), and supporting software.[28][29] Those product lines were expanded in 2015 with multiple additions to the company's industrial-embedded systems category.[30]

The company's memory and storage products employ a variety of form factors and interfaces, including DIMM[31][32] memory modules for DDR3L, MiniDIMM and ECC SoDIMM[33] memory modules for DDR3L, and M.2,[34] mSATA, CFast, Slim SATA, CompactFlash, PCI Express Mini Card, and eUSB SLC SSDs.

Competitors include SMART Modular Technologies and Swissbit.

References

  1. ^ "Bloomberg Business". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Company Overview of Virtium Technology, Inc.
  2. ^ "EE Journal". 26 March 2020. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Worried About Your SSD Data? Virtium Has You Covered!
  3. ^ "Military & Aerospace Electronics". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Today’s military data storage goes far beyond rugged
  4. ^ "Orange County Register". 13 May 2008. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Former Vietnamese refugee now heads major Rancho company
  5. ^ "Orange County Business Journal". 20 March 2013. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Business Journal Honors Excellence in Entrepreneurship
  6. ^ "Orange County Register". 11 June 2014. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) 3 Irvine professionals among Entrepreneur of the Year winners
  7. ^ "Orange County Business Journal". 24 September 2017. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Free to Innovate -- Tech Manufacturing Founder Found His Spot After Flight from Vietnam
  8. ^ "The SSD Review". 14 August 2015. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Finds Industrial Trends Entering Consumer Market – Flash Memory Summit 2015 Update
  9. ^ "EE Times". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium introduces embedded SATA SSDs
  10. ^ "Tom's Hardware". 30 May 2014. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Introduces M.2 SSDs
  11. ^ "Electronic Design". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Encrypted SSDs Take Aim at Industrial IoT Applications
  12. ^ "EE World Online". 24 October 2017. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) ECN IMPACT Awards 2017 Announces Winner Placements
  13. ^ "Computer Technology Review". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium debuts TuffDrive, its eUSB 3.0 embedded storage modules
  14. ^ "Electronic Design". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Electronic Design’s Products of the Week
  15. ^ "Embedded Computing Design". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Introduces NVMe SSDs
  16. ^ "IoT Innovator". 7 February 2019. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Offers Industrial 3D NAND-based SSDs to Tackle Embedded, Industrial IoT Applications
  17. ^ "Military & Aerospace Electronics". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) High-reliability solid-state drives (SSDs) for avionics and reconnaissance data introduced by Virtium
  18. ^ "IoT Innovator". 24 October 2019. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium's StorFly Industrial SSD Now Comes in 4TB Capacity; Delivers I-Temp Support, Integrated Data Protection
  19. ^ "IoT Innovator". 18 February 2020. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Releases StorKit SSD Software Tools, Speeds Migration from SLC / MLC to Higher-Density Flash Memory
  20. ^ "Help Net Security". 25 June 2020. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium expands StorFly line of industrial-grade SSDs to protect IIoT data in extreme temperatures
  21. ^ "5G Evolution World". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) SolidRun and Virtium Charge Toward 5G Future
  22. ^ "StorageReview". 14 March 2021. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) News Bits: Quantum, Qumulo, AWS, WekaIO, Virtium, CTERA, & Excelero
  23. ^ "Electronic Design". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Embedded Products and Solutions of the Week (5/3 - 5/9)
  24. ^ "Forbes". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Some Storage Has To Last
  25. ^ "TMCnet News". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Introduces Industry's First CFexpress Removable NVMe Solid-State Drives with PCIe 4.0, Industrial Temperature Support
  26. ^ "Orange County Register". 5 August 2015. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) L Squared Capital of Newport Beach invests in storage, memory firm
  27. ^ "AltAssets". Court Square backs next-gen IoT data storage, memory developer Virtium
  28. ^ "DigiTimes". Virtium ruggedized DDR3 MicroDIMM
  29. ^ "StorageSearch". industrial SSDs
  30. ^ "Electronic Design". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Electronic Design’s Products of the Week
  31. ^ "EE Times Asia". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) DDR2 blade modules eye embedded computing
  32. ^ "CDRinfo". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Starts Offering DDR4 VLP RDIMM Samples
  33. ^ "EE Times". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) SODIMM combines SATA SSD, DDR SDRAM technologies
  34. ^ "Tom's Hardware". 30 May 2014. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help) Virtium Introduces M.2 SSDs

External links

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