SMART Modular Launches nvNITRO NVMe Storage Accelerator Featuring MRAM Technology in New U.2 Form Factor


The nvNITRO™ U.2 Storage Accelerator provides ultra-low latency to dramatically improve system performance

NEWARK, Calif., Nov. 12, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- SMART Modular Technologies, Inc., a subsidiary of SMART Global Holdings, Inc., (NASDAQ: SGH), and a leader in specialty memory, storage and hybrid solutions including memory modules, Flash memory cards and other solid state storage products, today announced that it has launched its new nvNITRO U.2 Storage Accelerator featuring MRAM technology. SMART has partnered with Everspin Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: MRAM), the world's leading developer and manufacturer of discrete and embedded magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM), to enable the launch of the new Spin-Transfer Torque MRAM (STT-MRAM)-based nvNITRO Storage Accelerator. The nvNITRO is ideally suited for synchronous logging applications such as those used for financial trading. 

SMART’s nvNITRO U.2 Storage Accelerator uses a standard NVMe interface that is 1.2.1 compliant and provides less than six microseconds of industry-leading low latency access with persistence so that all logging data is safe. The NVMe protocol provides additional benefits such as higher performance vs. SAS or SATA-based SSDs, interoperability, reduced latency in the host software stack, and higher input/output operations per second (IOPS).

The U.2 form factor brings with it the advantage of being hot-swappable. U.2 drives can be installed/removed from a chassis for servicing without requiring a server to be rebooted. The advantages of MRAM technology are that it is persistent with very low latency, enabling dramatically improved system performance for many applications. The nvNITRO Storage Accelerator fully exploits these unique attributes to provide a disruptive solution for industries where transaction processing and data recording performance are critical. For example, nvNITRO can reduce financial application wait times by reducing latency up to 90% over enterprise SSDs.

The nvNITRO Storage Accelerator enables a system application to write or log large amounts of data at the full performance rate of incoming data and provides extremely low, and highly consistent read latencies of under 6µs. This enables a customer to utilize a single nvNITRO card as a persistent write buffer connected to less expensive backend storage devices. The nvNITRO U.2 Storage Accelerator provides a very cost effective solution for logging information and accessing terabytes of data at very high performance, while providing power loss protection for data. No super capacitors, UPS or batteries are required because nvNITRO is power fail safe through its use of STT-MRAM persistent memory technology.

To learn more about SMART’s nvNITRO U.2 NVMe Storage Accelerator please visit http://www.smartm.com/nvNITRO.

Connect with SMART on LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/company/smart-modular-technologies.

About SMART Modular Technologies
SMART Modular Technologies is a global leader in specialty memory, storage and hybrid solutions serving the electronics industry for over 25 years. SMART Modular delivers solutions to a broad customer base, including OEMs in computing, networking, communications, storage, mobile and industrial markets. Focused on providing extensive customer-specific design capabilities, technical support and value-added testing services, SMART collaborates closely with their global OEM customers throughout their design process and across multiple projects to create memory, storage and hybrid solutions for demanding applications with differentiated requirements. Taking innovations from the design stage through manufacturing and supply, SMART Modular has developed a comprehensive product line comprised of DRAM, Flash and hybrid memory technologies across various form factors. SMART Modular is a subsidiary of SMART Global Holdings, Inc. See www.smartm.com for more information.

About Everspin Technologies 
Headquartered in Chandler, Arizona, Everspin Technologies, Inc. is the worldwide leader in the design, volume production and distribution of Magnetoresistive RAM (MRAM) into markets and applications where data persistence, performance, and endurance are paramount. Serving applications across the data center, industrial, and transportation markets, Everspin has built the strongest and fastest-growing foundation of MRAM users in the world. For more information, visit www.everspin.com

SMART Contact:
Arthur Sainio
SMART Modular Technologies
(510) 624-8126
arthur.sainio@smartm.com  

Everspin Contacts:
Charlie Rubin
Story Public Relations
(510) 908-3356
charlie@storypr.com

Leanne K. Sievers
Shelton Group Investor Relations
(949) 224-3874
sheltonir@sheltongroup.com

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at http://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/108c2f2b-b5d5-4b0c-862b-6638b5d7c6dd

nvNITRO U.2 NVMe Storage Accelerator