IBM Acquiring Texas Memory Systems

IBM Corp. has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Texas Memory Systems, Inc. (TMS), developer of high-performance flash memory solutions.

TMS is a privately held company based in Houston, TX.

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Founded in 1978, TMS designs and sells high-performance solid state storage solutions. Unlike HDDs that rely on spinning disks and robotic arms, solid state systems are high-speed data storage solutions based on flash or RAM memory that can provide faster throughput and data access while consuming less power.

TMS offers its solid state solutions as the RamSan family of shared rackmount systems and PCIe cards. The products are designed to help companies improve performance and reduce server sprawl, power consumption, cooling, and floor space requirements, all of which in turn can help clients save money, improve performance and invest more in innovation.

"The TMS strategy and solution set align well with our Smarter Computing approach to information technology by helping clients realize increased performance and efficiencies at lower costs," said Brian Truskowski, GM, Systems Storage and Networking, IBM. "Solid state technology, in particular, is a critical component of our new Smarter Storage approach to the design and deployment of storage infrastructures, and part of a holistic approach that exploits flash in conjunction with disk and tape technologies to solve complex problems."

IDC estimates the amount of solid state storage solutions being shipped into the enterprise will grow significantly, reaching nearly 3EB by 2016.

Following acquisition close, IBM plans to invest in and support the TMS product portfolio, and will look to integrate over time TMS technologies into solutions including storage, servers, software, and PureSystems offerings.

"IBM understands the positive and dramatic impact that solid state technology can have on storage and server infrastructures, and once the acquisition is complete we look forward to advancing the technology even further. With the global reach of IBM, we expect to grow the engineering staff and product lines much faster than we could before," said Holly Frost, founder and CEO of TMS.

TMS employs approximately 100 people.

The deal is expected to close later in 2012.

Comments

IBM and privately-held Texas Memory are among the oldest storage companies. Big Blue launched its first tape drive in 1952 and the first HDD in 1956.

TMS was born in 1978 to design and produce extremely fast storage subsystems based on RAM - not HDDs. But they were extremely expansive, need batteries and to be backuped on HDDs. The company was always reluctant to give the price of its configurations. It was just a niche market for a small number of very high-end high-performance applications needing more than 40,000 IO/s.

The arrival of cheaper flash chips helped the company to extend its market with devices based on SSDs. TMS more recently added to its portfolio faster PCIe SSDs (SLC and eMLC), one of the hottest products today in the storage industry with its systems offering up to 1,200,000 IO/s, 2.5GB/s random sustained external throughput, with ECC and RAID capabilities.

In the deal IBM will also acquire several excellent patents assigned to TMS.

The two companies were also already working together. In 2009, Texas Memory announced that its RamSan-500 solid-state disk system has been certified interoperable with IBM SVC. It is also partnering with NetApp for the same RamSan-500.

Up to now IBM was working with several suppliers like Fusion-io, Micron, Smart Modular, Stec or Violin to get flash memory devices. With TMS, it will have flash subsystems to boost mission-critical applications of its high-end customers.

SSD is probably today the fastest storage activity and generated many acquisitions these last months: SanDisk bought Schooner Information Technology, SK hynix Link_A_Media Devices, EMC XtremIO, SanDisk FlashSoft, Micron Virtensys, Apple Anobit, Seagate invested in DensBits, etc.

And there are other rumors of acquisitions. Seagate was apparently interested by OCZ, but nothing happened. EMC may consider to get Fusion-io, recent partner of rival NetApp.