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Here is a likely example:

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FMD: coulda been a contenda
We should also mention here a technology often written up alongside all of the above, namely FMD or fluorescent multilayer disc, from New York-based Constellation 3D.

Instead of the reflective coating found in existing discs, FMD uses fluorescent dyes to coat multiple layers of substrate within each disc. Current DVDs use only two layers on a single-sided disc because the reflective coating causes too much interference for data to be read back. But fluorescent dyes, which don't cause a noise problem, record data by emitting fluorescent light in varying patterns to represent 1s and 0s. FMD increases capacity simply because it uses more of the media in a disc of the same size.

Constellation was promising a DVD-sized disc that could hold 140GB of data using red lasers, or more than a terabyte using blue lasers. Last July, the company seemed to be on the verge of a breakthrough when it signed a licensing deal with Warner Advanced Media Operations (WAMO), an AOL subsidiary and one of the world's largest manufacturers of DVDs.

Last July, the company seemed to be on the verge of a breakthrough.

But since then, Constellation 3D has fallen victim to the economic downturn and perhaps to its own failure to meet the manufacturing goals established with WAMO. It's hard to tell exactly what went wrong; none of the company's executives nor its partners will return calls for comment. The employees that haven't been actually laid off are reportedly working without pay and have vacated their offices. The company is still traded on the Nasdaq SmallCap market, but has fallen to less than 30 cents per share from a high of more than $60.

The company is awaiting a life-sustaining infusion of cash from a mysterious Swiss company called TIC Target Investing Consulting, which was supposed to have provided a $15 million investment in March but has so far failed to do so despite repeated assurances of its good intentions.

If Constellation 3D goes under, which seems likely, then its patents may well resurface with another player, but for the time being, this promising technology, once considered a potential DVD killer by Byte magazine and other major trade titles, appears to be down for the count.