TOKYO (DATA STORAGE EXPO), June 26, 2002 — Sony Corporation today announced that Hitachi, Ltd., a Sony systems OEM customer, is offering Advanced Intelligent Tape™ (AIT) drives as an option with its HA8000 server series marketed in Japan.

The new Hitachi AIT tape drives are based on the Sony AIT-2 drive which features 50GB of native capacity (100GB with 2:1 compression) and a 6MB/sec sustained transfer rate (12MB/sec with 2:1 compression). The drives are being offered with Hitachi's HA8000 line-up of servers, which includes the 30W, 70W, 110W, 130W, 170, and 270 models to deliver an affordable backup and archival solution for low-end to high-end computing environments.

"Our new AIT-2 drives are an integral part of the Hitachi line-up of server options for managing and protecting valuable data in workgroup, midrange and enterprise-level environments," said Toru Kaneko, general manager of development operation for the Internet Systems Platform Division, Ubiquitous Platform Systems at Hitachi, Ltd. "Our customers require a reliable, robust and cost-effective backup and archival storage solution, and AIT technology addresses those needs in addition to providing the necessary capacity and performance."

"Hitachi's integration of the Sony AIT format demonstrates the strength and growing adoption of AIT technology," said Akihiro Hasegawa, senior general manager of global strategic accounting management in Sony Corporation's Electronic Devices Marketing Group. "AIT technology is designed to meet the current and future expectations and demands of customers who are looking for a cost-effective, reliable and scalable storage solution."

About AIT Technology
A result of Sony's 50 years of innovation and technological excellence in magnetic recording techniques and mechanisms, the AIT format is a future-oriented technology that sets new performance and capacity standards for high-density data recording. Since its introduction in 1996, the AIT-1 model has been enhanced and now fills the price-point gap between low-end DDS and high-end tape storage solutions. The longevity, ease of maintenance, scalability and backward compatibility of the AIT family further underscores the extended technology roadmap offered to customers with changing capacity and performance requirements. AIT technology now offers from 35GB to up to 100GB of native capacity per cartridge and a roadmap, which includes a sixth-generation drive with up to 800GB of capacity before the end of the decade.

Contacts
Elizabeth Mousourakis
Sony Electronics Inc.
(408) 955-5616
elizabeth.mousourakis@am.sony.com