Kingston Technology, which focuses on memory products like RAM and solid state drives, is buying a NT$96 million (~US$3,3 million) stake in JMicron, DigiTimes reports. JMicron’s board of directors approved the sale of 1.5 million shares to Kingston at around US$2.21 each. What’s particularly interesting about this investment is that JMicron is one of the major players in the SSD controller market, as well as USB 3.0 storage devices, both of which are areas Kingston is active in.
Kingston uses JMicron controllers in its SSDs and reportedly accounted for nearly a third of JMicron’s controller shipments in 2010. This investment/partnership, or whatever you want to call it, ensures that JMicron will remain a prominent player in the SSD space, at least on Kingston’s end, at a time when most of the hype is focused on high-end SandForce and Barefoot Indilinx controllers.
