the first usb flash drive appeared on the retail market in early 2000.
the first usb flash drive appeared on the retail market in early 2000.
when did the first usb flash drive appear on the retail market?
early 2000
m-systems, an israeli company, were granted a us patent on november 14, 2000, titled "architecture for a [usb]-based flash disk", and crediting the invention to amir ban, dov moran and oron ogdan, all m-systems employees at the time. the patent application was filed by m-systems in april 1999. later in 1999, ibm filed an invention disclosure by one of its employees. flash drives were sold initially by trek 2000 international, a company in singapore, which began selling in early 2000. ibm became the first to sell usb flash drives in the united states in 2000. the initial storage capacity of a flash drive was 8 mb. another version of the flash drive, described as a pen drive, was also developed. pua khein-seng from malaysia has been credited with this invention. patent disputes have arisen over the years, with competing companies including singaporean company trek technology and chinese company netac technology, attempting to enforce their patents. trek won a suit in singapore, but has lost battles in other countries. netac technology has brought lawsuits against pny technologies, lenovo, aigo, sony, and taiwan's acer and tai guen enterprise co.
usb flash drive
usb flash drive alliance









































the 'usb flash drive alliance', founded in december 2003 by









































samsung, lexar media, kingston technology and others, is a group of companies promoting the use of usb flash drives (also called "keydrives" and a variety of other names).









































in 2003, according to the alliance, 50 million usb flash drives were sold in the us alone.









































section::::alliance members.









































bullet::::- buffalo technology









































bullet::::- corsair memory









































bullet::::- crucial technology









































bullet::::- infineon technologies









































bullet::::- kingston technology









































bullet::::- lexar media









































bullet::::- microsoft









































bullet::::- phison









































bullet::::- pny technologies









































bullet::::- samsung









































bullet::::- simpletech









































section::::see also.









































bullet::::- usb









































bullet::::- usb flash drive
usb flash drive alliance