Marvell Technology will be teaming up with Taiwan solid state drive maker Memoright as part of a deal that will see them use their controller ICs alongside Memoright's firmware to build a completely new SSD, according to industry sources in the country. The partnership is explicitly described as Marvell investing in Memoright although financial terms weren't mentioned in the report.

Marvell, along with LSI, accounts for roughly 70 percent of the global controller IC market but unlike the latter, they don't provide firmware with their hardware. Instead, they leave this step to the vendors.

Despite the fact that their hardware can be found in drives from the likes of Corsair, Crucial and OCZ, not having their own firmware has reportedly proven to be a bottleneck in marketing their product, the sources said.

With Memoright handling the firmware, Marvell would then be able to sell a complete package to vendors - think along the lines of LSI-Sandforce. This is good news for PC enthusiasts as Memoright has somewhat of a following based on their Endurance Write firmware architecture.

This tech is currently available in QuadLife SSDs and supposedly offers better NAND longevity, according to The Tech Report. The company claims it can extend the lifespan of MLC flash by 20,000 additional write/erase cycles. Typical consumer drives wear out after around 5,000 or so cycles.

The duo also plans to work on smartphones and tablets, we're told. Memoright will be responsible for providing firmware for Marvell's eMMC controller ICs.