December 2007

Micromem Technologies is pleased to announce that it has successfully manufactured foundry grade fully functioning MRAM cells. This culminates an intensive three-year research and development proof of concept phase followed by a foundry phase focused on manufacturability and scalability of our MRAM product. The first phase of the foundry process will be completed in January 2008. Our development team at Strategic Solutions is to be applauded for working closely with the California -based foundry Global Communication Services (GCS) to meet the aggressive schedule that the Company initiated in the fall of 2007.

Reference is made to the September 17, 2007 press release wherein the Company described the Reticle Design and Test Plan. The initial foundry phase has generated an extensive amount of statistically validated MRAM performance data in accordance with the scheduled Test Plan. During January 2008 the Company will be analyzing this large data set. Initial data review indicates that the Test Plan was successful and the data set is rich with scalable data that indicates a clear path to an optimized MRAM cell design.

Hitachi and a group from Japan's Tohoku University have developed a new type of memory element structure for MRAM that promises to eventually lead to gigabit-level versions of this next-generation memory technology.

For their MRAM memory element, Hitachi and the university group employed spin injection, a technology that is used for hard-drive magnetic heads and enables the structure around the element to be simplified. For the free layer where the bit is actually recorded, the element adopts the same laminated-ferri structure used in MRAM devices sold by U.S. firm Freescale Semiconductor Inc. This free layer has a double-layered composition made from cobalt-iron-boron and ruthenium.

Using these technologies, if an MRAM chip were fabricated using a 45-nanometer process, it could store the same gigabit level of data as DRAM.

Hitachi and the university group still need to develop other essential technologies for the MRAM, but hope to have a high-capacity chip ready within several years.

New York University and Allied Minds, a seed investment corporation specializing in early stage university business ventures, have teamed to establish Spin Transfer Technologies, LLC (STT), a new start-up company, to develop and commercialize a novel, more efficient form of computer memory, STT-MRAM.

New York University researchers have developed a new form of magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM), which will provide non-volatile storage of frequently updated, critical data, and instant-on convenience. The patented MRAM technology uses spin transfer to rapidly change the magnetic orientation of nanometer scale magnets.

"Our MRAM technology has the potential to provide significant advantages over competing approaches and may enable our devices to have higher write speeds, lower power consumption and be scalable to next generation process technologies," says Professor Andrew Kent of New York University.

"MRAM is expected to be the dominant next-generation memory technology. We're very pleased to be working with STT and New York University," says Allied Minds COO Marc Eichenberger.

Freescale Semiconductor today announced the industrial and extended temperature qualification of its award-winning magnetoresistive random access memory (MRAM) products. Freescale's entire 1Mbit, 2Mbit and 4Mbit MRAM families are now available at commercial (0 C to 70 C), industrial (0 C to 85 C) and extended (-40 C to105 C) temperature ranges.

The industrial and extended temperature range MRAM devices are designed to be used in rugged application environments, such as industrial, military, aerospace and automotive designs. The commercial MRAM devices are intended for less environmentally demanding applications, such as networking, security, data storage, gaming and printers.

“Freescale is dedicated to expanding the market for MRAM into all market segments,” said David Bondurant, MRAM product manger at Freescale. “Extended temperature qualification of MRAM demonstrates our industry-leading reliability when compared to other non-volatile memory products.”

MRAM offers exceptional price/performance within the high-density nvRAM market by combining the best features of non-volatile memory and RAM to enable "instant-on" capability and power loss protection in new classes of intelligent electronic devices. In addition, MRAM devices operate at SRAM speeds over a wide range of temperatures without the need for battery-backup.