Kingston Technology Celebrates 30 Years Supplying the World with Quality Technology Solutions

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Founded October 17, 1987

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Largest Third-party Memory Maker in
the World; Leader in Storage Solutions & Peripherals

Taipei, Taiwan – October 17, 2017 – Kingston Technology, a world leader in
memory storage products and technology solutions, announces today that it celebrates its 30th
year in the business as an innovative technology hardware provider for
computers and devices. Kingston® was co-founded on October 17, 1987,
by CEO John Tu and COO David Sun. The two co-founders continue to guide the
company and remain very active in day-to-day operations.

            The
entrepreneurial spirit of both owners and the success of the company have been
recognized globally through the years. Kingston’s core tenets of respect, loyalty, flexibility and
integrity have created an exemplary corporate culture — one that guides its
relationships with customers, partners and vendors, and to which Kingston owes
its success. The company continues to be the largest supplier of DRAM modules
among non-semiconductor manufacturers and a leading maker of Flash memory products
— especially SSDs — where it has become a dominant force among consumers and organizations
alike looking to upgrade existing systems and data centers. A video celebrating
30 years can be found here.

            Kingston
manufactured just one product when it started in 1987 and has steadily and
strategically evolved as a company by controlling as much of the production
cycle as possible —
from initial wafer processing through finished product — for both DRAM and
Flash. The company has done this through expansion, strategic investments,
partnerships and adapting to industry needs as early as possible.

Seeing SSDs as the future for hard drives in both client
PCs and data centers, the company began offering SSD products in 2009 and last
year analyst firm Forward Insights cited Kingston as the second-largest supplier of SSDs in the channel. The company
also saw the growing demand for smart phones, tablets, IoT-based devices and
wearables. In 2010, it formed Kingston Solutions, Inc. (KSI), which
manufactures embedded memory products (single-chip storage and controller
solutions) that go into lighter and thinner everyday consumer devices. Today,
KSI is the leader in embedded solutions for second-tier smart phone
manufacturers.

The product portfolio has further expanded in recent years
to headsets, keyboards, mice and mouse pads via its HyperX™ gaming brand, and the innovative products have rapidly
gained accolades and acceptance among professional gamers and pro sports
athletes. It took only two years for HyperX to ship its 1-millionth gaming
headset. Today, Kingston through all its brands and product categories offers
over 2,000 quality technology solutions and ships to more than 120 countries.
It is a widely recognized and accepted brand known the world over.

            “David (Sun) and I were almost broke
when we started this little company 30 years ago and there weren’t that many
people doing what we did outside of the big PC makers,” said John Tu, CEO and
co-founder, Kingston. “We had no idea how it would turn out but due to lots of
luck and people whom we previously worked with who liked and helped us, we were
able to slowly grow and build up a successful organization. I feel very blessed
and fortunate every day I come into the office.”

            “Our good fortune as a company is due
to the hard work of our employees and the respect we have for each other. When
John (Tu) and I started this company, we wanted everyone who worked here to
feel like they are part of a family,” said David Sun, COO and co-founder,
Kingston. “Our philosophy for the last 30 years has been, ‘If we take care of
our employees and vendors, they will take care of our customers.’ This has not
changed and none of Kingston’s success happens without family.”

·
1987: Kingston begins operations in Orange
County, Calif., with a new Single In-Line Memory Module (SIMM) that creates an
industry standard for memory modules.

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1992: Kingston is ranked by Inc.
magazine as the fastest-growing privately held company in America.

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1995: Kingston opens its first overseas
office in Munich, Germany to better provide support to its European customers.

·
1995: Kingston joins the Billion-Dollar
Club as sales exceed $1.3 billion (USD).

·
1996: Kingston and Toshiba co-Market memory
upgrades for Toshiba PCs. This is the first time ever that a PC OEM and a
memory manufacturer teamup.

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1997: Kingston expands its global footprint
as it establishes the headquarters for Asia-Pacific operations including a
manufacturing facility and offices in Taiwan. Kingston also opens its first
office to serve South American customers in Brazil. Its European headquarters
move to the United Kingdom and a manufacturing/logistics facility in Dublin,
Ireland is opened.

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1997:
Kingston Technology Services Division
(KTSD) is formed to exclusively work and manufacture memory solutions directly
for OEM customers such as Dell.

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1999:
Kingston purchases a controlling
interest in Powertech Technology, Inc., now the world’s largest back end wafer
and chip packaging and testing facility for both DRAM and Flash. The purchase
further strengthens Kingston’s ability to control all facets of the
memory-manufacturing cycle from wafer to finished good.

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2000: Payton Technology Inc. is established
to help manage Kingston’s memory supply chain as well as supply back end wafer
processing services making the company more efficient in delivering memory
solutions to its rapidly expanding client base.

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2001:
Kingston begins assembling memory
modules in Shanghai, China.

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2002:
HyperX begins with its first product,
high-performance memory modules.

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2003:
Kingston begins shipping Flash memory
products.

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2004:
iSuppli (now IHS Markit®)
ranks Kingston as the world’s No. 1 memory module manufacturer for the
third-party memory market, a streak that has continued each year to date
uninterrupted.

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2005:
Kingston opens the world’s largest
memory module manufacturing facility in Shanghai, China.

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2006:
Kingston revenue reaches $3 billion
(USD).

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2009:
Kingston’s Asia-Pacific region reaches
the $1 billion (USD) mark in sales for the first time.

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2010:
Kingston and Phison Electronics Corporation form Kingston Solutions, Inc., a
joint venture manufacturing embedded memory products for the emerging mobile
industry.

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2010:
Kingston revenue reaches a new record
high of $6.5 billion (USD).

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2013:
Gartner Research ranks Kingston as the
No. 1 USB manufacturer for the 6th straight year.

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2013:
Kingston ships the world’s largest and
first 1TB USB Flash drive.

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2014:
HyperX launches its first gaming
headset.

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2016:
HyperX sells its 1-millionth headset.

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2017:
Kingston ships the world’s largest and
first 2TB USB Flash drive.

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2017:
Kingston ships the second-most SSDs in
the channel in 2016 according to Forward Insights.

·
2017:
Kingston celebrates its 30th
anniversary on October 17.

Kingston can be found on: