All About U3 and U3 SmartDrives

U3 LLC. is a joint venture that is backed by Sandisk and M-Systems.

U3 is responsible for the development of a proprietary application design specification created for Microsoft Windows operating systems so that applications can be executed directly from a specially formatted USB flash drive. Applications are allowed to write files or registry information to the host computer, but this information must be removed when the flash drive is ejected.

USB flash drives adhering to the U3 specification are termed "U3 smart drives" by U3.com. "U3 smart drives" differ from traditional USB flash drives because they come preinstalled with the U3 Launchpad, which emulates the Windows OS start menu, and controls program installation.

I. Contact:

U3 LLC
303 Twin Dolphin Drive
Suite 200
Redwood City, CA 94065 USA
650-551-7400
fax: 650-551-7401

II. The U3 team:

The U3 team brings industry insight and deep expertise in building technology platforms and software developer communities to the exciting opportunities afforded by smart drive computing.

Kate Purmal Chief Executive Officer

Kate Purmal has more than 20 years of computer industry experience as an entrepreneur, corporate executive and independent consultant. Prior to U3, her successful management consulting business landed her in roles at Adobe, CBS MarketWatch, Hewlett-Packard, Intuit, Palm and Handspring, and dozens of start-ups. Kate was a founding member of palmOne (formerly Palm Computing), where she built and ran the product marketing and strategic alliance organizations. She helped palmOne launch its platform and successful developer community which now boasts hundreds of thousands of developers. In addition, Kate has held senior roles in marketing, product marketing, business development, sales, and engineering at Interleaf, Grid Systems, and Computer Associates. Kate holds a bachelor’s degree in applied mathematics from the University of California in San Diego.

Steve Brown Vice President of Business Development

Steve Brown has held senior executive roles in a number of major wireless and mobile enterprise technology companies including palmOne (formerly Palm Computing) and Aether Systems. His experience with Palm, Motorola, Riverbed, Aether and Everypath spans all aspects of the mobile computing chain – hardware, middleware, platforms, systems integration and service, and mobile applications. Steve joined U3 from Everypath, a developer of mobile applications for enterprise customers, where he was senior director of business development. At palmOne, Steve closed partnerships with companies including Sony, Samsung, Handspring and Oracle. He forged palmOne’s strategic plan and business models for entry into the licensing business, which established Palm OS as the dominant platform for handheld devices. Steve was responsible for channel analysis, development and sales with Apple. Steve holds a bachelor’s degree in human biology from Stanford University and a master’s degree in business administration from Northwestern University's Kellogg Graduate School of Management.

Esther Kruijver Vice President of Platform

Esther has more than 15 years of experience in the software and services industries as an entrepreneur and member of executive management teams. Her areas of expertise include executing strategic leadership in business planning, setting strategies and building marketing and channel plans. Esther founded Eureeka Ventures where she worked to expand small- to medium-sized businesses by building strategic alliances and developing new businesses in North America, Europe and Australia. Esther developed her small business experience and passion for early-stage business development and outbound marketing serving as general manager of Intuit’s UK business. As founder of the Intuit Developer Network, Esther managed a network for third-party developers that integrated their applications with Intuit’s small business software. Her responsibilities included the creation and management of the Intuit Developer Network strategy and programs; marketing and channel management; Application Programming Interface (API) strategy development and execution and general team management. Prior to Intuit, Esther held positions in the payment industry with NCR and Intellect-Prodata in marketing, sales and business development. Esther has a bachelor’s degree in computer science from the University of The Hague, the Netherlands.

Jim Allison Vice President of Engineering

Jim Allison has spent more than 20 years in the high tech industry, leading top-performance teams from companies such as Palm, iVast, 3Com, Autodesk, and Pensoft. Prior to U3, as vice president of engineering at iVast, Jim led efforts to revitalize and mature product development for an MPEG-4 based broadband interactive software developer. At Palm, Jim served as the senior director of engineering, where he was responsible for engineering reorganization and contributed to the successful creation of Palm’s third business unit, Palm.net. An expert in engineering management, Jim specializes in building effective global product development organizations that create next-generation software, device, and service products. His experience as an entrepreneur and high tech executive resulted in the successful release of commercial products such as Palm.net, the Palm III, V, and VII, Autodesk Mechanical and Architectural Libraries, EO Personal Communicator, Pensoft Perspective, Odesta Helix, and the Mindset Personal Computer. Jim holds a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Northwestern University.

III. The U3 Platform:

A. U3 Launchpad

The U3 Launchpad is a program manager that is preinstalled on every U3 smart drive, and is set to autoplay on insertion. [1]
The program is made to work with Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 and above. No Launchpad program exists for the Mac OS or Linux platforms. [2]

B. U3 Applications

To be fully U3 compliant, an application has to be programmed to clean up its own data from the local machine. It must also be packaged in U3's special program format. U3 applications will only run from a U3 device.

C. APIs

The U3 APIs allows U3 Programs lower-level access to USB flash drive.

D. Hardware

U3 smart drives are traditional USB flash drives with a specific setup
Disk Management shows two drives, one drive has a CDFS partition with the autorun and LaunchPad, and the other drive has a FAT partition that includes a hidden SYSTEM folder with your installed applications.
Optional: U3 Compliant Applications Preloaded
Hardware manufacturers can get the hardware development kit by emailing licensing@u3.org. [3]

E. Compatibility

The U3 Launchpad and U3 Applications will only run on newer Microsoft Windows Operating Systems (Microsoft Windows 2000 with Service Pack 4 and Windows XP).
Data will continue to be accessible from any OS capable of reading from USB Mass Storage Devices, unless the U3 device is password protected [4].
If the OS in question can normally see ordinary USB flash drives, then the U3 smart drive removable mass storage area (domain) should still be available for standard file system activities unless it is a private area protected by a password.

F. Developer Resources

Information on building U3 compliant applications, and the U3 software development kit, are available to registered developers at the official U3 website. Individuals must register (as a company) to download the SDK, or participate in the forums. [5]

G. Benefits of Use

Ultimate portability: Can provide students with disabilities the ability to carry their assistive technology applications with them from PC to PC. This can be especially beneficial when needing/wanting to access PCs located in places of public accommodation such as community centers, public libraries, cyber cafes, friend's houses, college computer labs, etc.
Private and protected computing: When students finish using a PC they simply unplug their U3 smart drive and walk away knowing that their AT, personal settings and personal files leave with them.
Personalized computing on shared PCs: Multiple students with disabilities can share the same PC yet maintain the privacy and familiarity of their software, customized interfaces, and files.