Editing Control Data Corporation (section)

== Magnetic Peripherals Inc. ==
{{Redirect|Imprimis Technology|the expansion card manufacturer|Boca Research}}
Meanwhile, several very large Japanese manufacturing firms were entering the market. The supercomputer market was too small to support more than a handful of companies, so CDC started looking for other markets. One of these was the hard disk drive (HDD) market.

'''Magnetic Peripherals Inc.''', later '''Imprimis Technology''', was originally a joint venture with [[Honeywell]] formed in 1975 to manufacture HDDs for both companies. CII-Honeywell Bull later purchased a 3 percent interest in MPI from Honeywell. [[Sperry Corporation|Sperry]] became a partner in 1983 with 17 percent, making the ownership split CDC (67%) and Honeywell (17%). MPI was a captive supplier to its parents. It sold on an OEM basis only to them,<ref>Joint Ventures, Alliances, and Corporate Strategy,  Kathryn Rudie Harrigan, (c) 1985, p. 238</ref> while CDC sold MPI product to third parties under its brand name.

It became a major player in the HDD market. It was the worldwide leader in 14-inch disk drive technology in the [[Original equipment manufacturer|OEM]] marketplace in the late 1970s and early 1980s especially with its SMD ([[Storage Module Device]]) and CMD (Cartridge Module Drive), with its plant at [[Brynmawr]] in the [[South Wales]] valleys running [[24/7]] production. The Magnetic Peripherals division in Brynmawr had produced 1 million disks and 3 million magnetic tapes by October 1979. CDC was an early developer of the eight-inch drive technology with products from its MPI [[Oklahoma City]] Operation. Its [[CDC Wren]] series drives were particularly popular with high end users, although it was behind the capacity growth and performance curves of numerous startups such as [[Micropolis Corporation|Micropolis]], [[Atasi]], [[Maxtor]], and [[Quantum Corporation|Quantum]]. CDC also co-developed the now universal [[Advanced Technology Attachment]] (ATA) interface with [[Compaq]] and [[Western Digital]], which was aimed at lowering the cost of adding low-performance drives.

CDC founded a separate division called Rigidyne in [[Simi Valley, California|Simi Valley]], California, to develop 3.5-inch drives using technology from the Wren series. These were marketed by CDC as the "Swift" series, and were among the first high-performance 3.5-inch drives on the market at their introduction in 1987.

In September 1988, CDC merged Rigidyne and MPI into the umbrella subsidiary of [[Imprimis Technology]]. The next year, [[Seagate Technology]] purchased Imprimis for $250 million in cash, 10.7 million in Seagate stock and a $50 million promissory note.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RCRN09BFuYUC&q=Imprimis++seagate&pg=RA1-PA96|title=Computerworld| date=1989-10-09}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/06/13/business/control-data-to-sell-unit-to-seagate.html|title=Control Data To Sell Unit To Seagate|date=13 June 1989|work=The New York Times}}</ref>