History (1996): Philips Expects CD-RW to Reach Marketplace in Early 1997

Philips (Eindhoven, The Netherlands) expects its CD-ReWritables, based on phase-change technology, to reach the marketplace in early 1997.

“The many positive responses have strengthened our belief that CD-ReWritable could eventually serve to replace floppies, CD-ROM and recordables with one single function,” said Jan Oosterveld from Philips.

He elaborated on an under $1,000 price for the Atapi CDD-3610 drive (2X write, 6X read}, including software, with pricing between $20 and $25 for a 650MB blank disk. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Hewlett-Packard OEMing this unit.

This article is an abstract of news published on the former paper version of Computer Data Storage Newsletter on issue 107, published on December 1996.