CES: Folio Photonics Showcases Advancements in Enterprise-Scale Optical Storage Solution

Folio Photonics, Inc. will showcase how it is reenergizing storage media innovation with the first enterprise-scale, optical disk storage solution that delivers cost, margin, performance and sustainability benefits at CES 2023, taking place January 5-8, 2023, in Las Vegas, NV.

The company will join Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) in Tech West Hall G Eureka Park at CES. The firm and its licensed technology were spun-off from CWRU and its National Science Foundation Center for Layered Polymeric Systems by Dr. Kenneth Singer. Dr. Singer is the Ambrose Swasey, professor, physics, and director, engineering physics program, Case Western Reserve University, and founder and chief innovation officer, Folio Photonics.

CES attendees will be able to see how, by leveraging game-changing advancements in materials science to create high-capacity optical storage with improved write/read capabilities; a single Folio disc will have the same storage capacity as over 100 DVDs – with a long-term roadmap to 10TB on a single disc. For data center and hyperscale customers, the company’s next-gen storage media radically reduces upfront cost and TCO while making data archives active, cybersecure, performant, and sustainable.

“The high cost of storage is untenable with exploding data growth, cyber threats continuing to escalate, and data centers being one of the top contributors to energy/water usage and CO² emissions. Current HDD and LTO tape roadmaps reflect insufficient technological advancement to meet user requirements and desired price points in the future,” said Steven Santamaria, CEO. “We look forward to CES and the opportunity to show how Folio Photonics has achieved a significant breakthrough in multi-layer optical storage disc technology that will enable an unprecedented level of cost, security, performance and sustainability advantage.”

“Leveraging patented advancements in materials science, Folio Photonics has developed the first economically viable, enterprise-scale optical storage discs with dynamic multi-layer write/read capabilities, which will enable the development of radically low-cost/high-capacity disc storage,” he added.

Company will highlight:

• Novel materials – The firm achieves thin storage layers and high layer densities using novel fluorescent materials, mitigating issues of interlayer crosstalk found in traditional reflective optical storage media, such as DVDs and Blu-ray discs.

• Multi-layered film – These nanophotonic materials are embedded into multi-layer films via a highly scalable, efficient co-extrusion manufacturing process, enabling Folio to achieve record-low media costs.

• High capacity discs – Discs are the first application of Folio’s multi-layered film – providing random and rapid access to data across 16+ layers.

• Photonic drives – Data is written and accessed through a proprietary drive with a novel confocal optical pickup unit to track through layers at high spin speeds.