SandForce 2.0 - Tidal Systems Takes Shape

We recently discovered a new SSD controller design company is forming and many of the names involved are familiar. The group is headed up by CEO and co-founder Mike Lee. Mr. Lee's former employer was SK Hynix, where he was the Director of SSD SOC Development for the Link A Media Devices team (LAMD).

At this time, details nearly nonexistent other than a few bits of information scattered around the web. The above image started our hunt for more information. Many in the photo are former SandForce, LSI and Skyera employees and all are now with Tidal Systems.

We've often wondered what affects SandForce ping pong would have on employees. SandForce was first acquired by LSI, then LSI was acquired by Avago and then SandForce was spun off to Seagate. SandForce founder, CMO and former NVIDIA nForce chipset architect Radoslav Danilak started Skyera to focus on all-flash enterprise storage a few years ago. At least a handful of the pre-LSI SandForce team went with him. Skyera already has two products on the market, skyHawk and skyEagle.

We did find a short description about Tidal Systems online:

Leveraging our Revolutionary DATA-Compression and Error-Correction (LDPC) Algorithms to create most Powerful System Controller (SoC) and related firmware/software systems solutions to address fast growing NAND Flash Memory based storage products, which is essential for Cloud Computing; Big Data Center; Smartphone, Tablet PC and all Ultra-Portable Computing Appliance.

In short, they will make flash controllers. We wish the team good luck and hope to be the first to test the new products when ready.