Rumor: Kingston stops selling U3 products
Kingston Technology has stopped selling NAND flash disk drives that support U3, the platform advocated by SanDisk, due to the observed cost pressure from royalty payments, according to sources at the company. A quick look at the Kingston Technology Web Site shows that U3 devices are still listed for sale and no one at Kingston was available to comment on the rumors.
Sources at controller IC design houses had mentioned that SanDisk charges companies a 5% royalty fee for adopting the U3 platform in accordance to the volume shipped. Kingston has decided that it will stop shipping U3-supporting products in the future. Kingston explained its decision in saying that extra bundled software means additional costs for consumers. The company already has its own similar platform to substitute for U3, according to company sources. Memory module houses echoed Kingston’s statement saying royalty fees add additional cost and this is the major reason for the low penetration rate of U3 applications.
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