About the Author Thomas M. Coughlin is the Founder and President of Coughlin Associates. Tom has over 25 years of experience in the data storage industry as a working engineer and high level technical manager. In addition to regular technical and management consulting projects, he is the publisher of many reports covering technology and applications for digital storage devices and systems. He has many published papers, reports, and articles. He has six patents on magnetic recording and related technologies. Tom is the founder and organizer of the annual Storage Visions Conference, a partner event to the International CES. Tom is a senior member and 2007 Chairman of the Santa Clara Valley IEEE Section and was chairman of the Santa Clara Valley IEEE Consumer Electronics Society in 2006 and past chairman of the SCV IEEE Magnetics Society more than once. He is also a member of APS, AVS, IDEMA, SNIA, AAAS, TCG, and SMPTE. Tom has a BS in Physics, an MSEE from the University of Minnesota, and a PhD in Electrical Engineering from Shinshu University in Nagano, Japan. For more information on Coughlin Associates go to www.tomcoughlin.com. For more information on the Storage Visions Conference go to www.storagevisions.com.