Archive Corporation

Archive Corporation was a computer tape drive manufacturer, based in Costa Mesa, California, that was acquired by Conner Peripherals in 1993.

Archive Corporation

Industry	Computer
Founded	1980; 45 years ago (1980) in Costa Mesa, California
Defunct	1993; 32 years ago (1993)
Fate	Acquired by Conner Peripherals
Products	Tape drives
Number of employees	3,367 (1990)

History

The company was founded in 1980 and based out of Costa Mesa, California.^[1] The company employed 3,367 in 1990 and reached revenues of US$293 million in that year, up from $79 million in 1986.^[2]

Of particular note are the Archive DDS tape drives produced for Silicon Graphics that could also read and write Digital Audio Tapes: the Archive Python 4320 and the Archive Peregrine 4326 (rebranded under Conner or Seagate).^[3]

Prior to this, Archive was a leading vendor of the very popular quarter-inch cartridge (QIC) format which was a popular distribution format for Unix workstations and servers. For example, software for the Sun-3 (running the Motorola 68K family) and the Sun-4 (based on SPARC processors) was most commonly distributed on QIC media before CD-ROMs became more cost-effective. Archive was better known for their QIC drives.^[4]

Conner Peripherals acquired Archive in 1993.^[5]

Acquisitions

In 1989, Archive acquired Maynard Electronics.^[6] The MaynStream brand of tape drives and software was maintained.^[7]

In March 1990, Archive acquired Cipher Data Products for $120 million.^[8] This included Cipher's subsidiary Irwin Magnetic Systems.^[9]

References

1. Petska-Juliussen, Karen; Egil Juliussen (1990). The Computer Industry Almanac. Brady. p. 2.109. ISBN 9780131541221 – via the Internet Archive.
2. Smith, Carter (1992). America's Fastest Growing Employers: The Complete Guide to Finding Jobs with Over 700 of America's Hottest Companies. B. Adams, Inc. p. 35. ISBN 9781558501461 – via Google Books.
3. "Digital Audio Tape (DAT) FAQ". Computall Services. n.d. Archived from the original on December 8, 2006.
4. Staff writer (November 11, 1987). "Archive Corporation". Los Angeles Times: 4. Archived from the original on November 2, 2022.
5. Staff writer (November 18, 1992). "Conner Peripherals and Archive Approve Merger". The New York Times: D4. Archived from the original on May 26, 2015.
6. Staff writer (March 29, 1989). "Archive Completes Purchase". The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company: 1 – via ProQuest.
7. Burnett, Richard (October 5, 1992). "Maynard at Forefront of Backup: Sales skyrocket for manufacturer of PC systems". Orlando Sentinel: 19 – via ProQuest.
8. Staff writer (April 30, 1990). "Archive Completes Acquisition". The Wall Street Journal. Dow Jones & Company: 1 – via ProQuest.
9. Khermouch, Gerry (June 22, 1992). "Iomega sets challenge to Irwin in removable QIC tape drives". Electronic News. 38 (1917). Sage Publications: 13. Archived from the original on May 21, 2005.

External links

• Heemskerk, Jos (November 25, 2001). "Audio on a Computer DAT drive". XS4ALL. Archived from the original on December 14, 2001.
• Fleckstein, Erv (2011). "Archive Corporation Tape Cartridges". M. Farris & Associates. Archived from the original on March 17, 2021.