03-09-2009, 04:24 PM
In 1984 Drs. Arthur Pohm and Jim Daughton, both employed at that time by Honeywell, conceived of a new class of magnetoresistance memory devices which offered promise for high density, random access, nonvolatile memory. In 1989 Dr. Daughton left Honeywell to form Nonvolatile Electronics, Inc. having entered into a license agreement allowing him to sublicense Honeywell MRAM technology for commercial applications. Dr. Pohm, Dr. Daughton, and others at NVE continued to improve basic MRAM technology, and innovated new techniques which take advantage of revolutionary advances in magnetoresistive devices, namely giant magnetoresistance and spin dependent tunneling.
Today there is a tremendous potential for MRAM as a nonvolatile, solid state memory to replace flash memory and EEPROM where fast writing or high write endurance is required, and in the longer term as a general purpose read/write random access memory. NVE has a substantial patent portfolio containing 10 MRAM patents, and is willing to license these, along with 12 Honeywell MRAM patents, to companies interested in manufacturing MRAM. In addition, NVE is considering internal production of certain niche MRAM products over the next several years.
