On July 15th 2008, HP and Sony Corporation announced their agreement to create the seventh generation of the open standard DAT format - the DAT 320 - to provide robust and reliable data protection for small and midsize customers. HP and Sony will jointly develop the DAT 320 format but seperately bring to market tape drives and media to sell through their own storage channels with product availability expected in 2009. The DAT 320 format will also be open to other tape drive and media manufacturers.

Protecting valuable business data from corruption or loss, and archiving it for compliance purposes is a fundamental requirement for organizations of all sizes. With ever-increasing amounts of data to protect, tape backup remains a critical component of disaster recovery strategies as it provides the most cost-effective and efficient form of offsite storage away from human error, system error, computer viruses, fire, flood or natural disaster. That's why analysts IDC forecast the tape market to generate more than $1.4 billion in 2009±.

With their announcement, HP and Sony are targeting the most pressing business technology needs for SMBs with easy to manage, affordable data protection for data backup. When DAT 320 drives are brought to market, the 6 million† customers that already rely on DAT for data protection will be able to benefit from twice the capacity and almost double the performance of any other DAT drive currently available.

The DAT 320 will deliver backup speeds of up to 86 GB per hour with 2:1 data compression, allowing it to store a full 320 GB of data on a single cartridge in less than four hours. The DAT 320 will be read and write compatible with DAT 160 tape media providing an upgrade path for existing customers, support for WORM media cartridges provides an additional level of security. The format is also designed to consume fewer watts per GB than previous generations of DAT drive.

The joint announcement of DAT 320 combines the expertise of two industry leaders that share a legacy of delivering proven DAT/DDS technology; HP's strong technical base from the development of six generations of DAT and Sony's 50-year history in magnetic recording technology including Metal Evaporated (ME) media. The first four generations of DAT drive were the results of significant cooperation between HP, Sony and Seagate (which became Certance and is now acquired by Quantum). For DAT 72 and DAT160, Sony chose not to participate, preferring to focus on their AIT technology. This announcement brings Sony back into the core of the DAT market and allows future DAT products to benefit from the technological capabilities of the alliance.

± IDC Worldwide Tape Drive 2007-2011 Forecast and Analysis

† Estimated installed base of DAT drives currently in use