History 2001: Imation Can Sell DLT Cartridges

The first round in the Quantum/Imation legal battle over DLT cartridges has sent both companies back to their corners.

A California court has ruled in a preliminary injunction that Imation can sell the DLT cartridges it now manufactures, but that it must pay 30% royalties to Quantum. Both sides are claiming victory.

“This preliminary injunction vindicates Quantum’s position,” said Quantum chairman and CEO Mike Brown. “The Court protected what it recognized as Quantum’s valuable trade secrets by requiring Imation to pay Quantum for their use.”

In the other camp, Frank Russomanno, VP of Imation’s storage media and services, is no less jubilant: “The Court sided with Imation that we are entitled to be in the digital linear tape market by denying Quantum’s bid to exclude us. Customers and the marketplace won a victory today, along with Imation.”

As for its DLT IV Black Watch media, he added: “Demand has exceeded supply in the few weeks since introduction.”

The cartridges will not be available in Europe until January 2002.

On several commercial Internet sites, the price is hovering around $70.

Imation nevertheless decided that it will pursue its federal anti-trust claim, specifically charging that its adversary has conspired to fix prices and monopolize the DLT market.

From the transcript of the court proceedings, we learned that Imation had stated as early as fall of 1997 that it would sell DLT III cartridges before the year’s end without a Quantum license, although this never happened.

This article is an abstract of news published on issue 166 on November 2001 from the former paper version of Computer Data Storage Newsletter.