SK hynix develops a 238-layer NAND flash chip

Tech

Published: 03 Aug. 2022, 19:05 Updated: 03 Aug. 2022, 19:11

SK hynix develops a 238-layer NAND flash chip

SK hynix' 238-layer 512-gigabyte NAND flash memory chip [SK HYNIX]

SK hynix has developed a 238-layer NAND flash chip, the most advanced from the chipmaker to date.

The company on Wednesday introduced a sample of its new 238-layer 512 gigabyte TLC 4D NAND flash memory chip for the first time at the Flash Memory Summit 2022 in Santa Clara, California.

Mass production will begin in the first half of 2023, according to the chipmaker.

The 238-layer NAND flash developed by SK hynix has the most layers among existing memory semiconductors. Boise, Idaho-based Micron Technology, said on July 27 that it would start mass production of 232-layer NAND flash memory.

“The latest 238-layer product is most layered and smallest,” said an SK hynix spokesperson in a release. The small size translates into higher production efficiency, as a larger number of chips can be produced per wafer.

The new memory chip is 34 percent more efficient than the company's 176-layer product, which was developed in 2020, according to SK hynix.

The read speed increased by 50 percent to 2.4 gigabytes per second, and it consumes 21 percent less energy than the previous model.

The 238-layer products will be first used in PC storage devices, and later for servers.

The next step, the company said, is to develop a chip with a 1-terabyte capacity, double the current 512-gigabyte product, based on the advanced stacking technique.

“SK hynix secured global top-tier competitiveness in terms of cost, performance and quality by introducing the 238-layer product,” said Choi Jung-dal, head of NAND development at SK hynix during the Flash Memory Summit event Wednesday.

Choi Jung-dal, head of NAND development at SK hynix, speaks during his keynote speech at the Flash Memory Summit 2022 Wednesday, held in Santa Clara, California. [SK HYNIX]

Samsung Electronics also introduced next-generation memory technologies and products during the Flash Memory Summit event that day.

“The IT industry is facing a new set of challenges brought on by the explosive growth in big data,” said Choi Jin-Hyeok Choi, executive vice president of memory division at Samsung Electronics, “and this underscores the importance of a robust, cross-industry ecosystem.”

New technologies from Samsung Electronics include the Petabyte Storage high-capacity storage system, which the company expects to be marketed in five to 10 years when the amount of data transfer is forecast to grow explosively.

The Petabyte Storage will enable one petabyte of storage per single server unit, according to Samsung Electronics. Petabyte equals 1,000 terabytes.

The electronics maker also introduced a solid-state drive (SSD) based on Compute Express Link (CXL) technology, named Memory-Semantic SSD. CXL is an industry-standard interconnection that boosts the efficiency of data processing by maintaining the memory coherency of data stored in different locations.

Samsung Electronics explained that the SSD will boost the read speed in machine learning applications by 20 times compared to a regular SSD.

Moreover, the company said that its new Telemetry technology will detect and prevent any potential problems in data centers.

Samsung Electronics' Memory-semantic SSD [SAMSUNG ELECTRONICS]

Samsung Electronics added that the mass production of its universal flash storage (UFS) for mobile devices, introduced in May, will begin this month. The latest UFS 4.0 storage will accelerate data processing speed for high-resolution images and graphic-heavy games, said the company.

The Flash Memory Summit is an annual conference for NAND Flash products and technologies, the biggest of its kind in the world, held in Santa Clara every year. Started Tuesday, the event will run through Thursday.

BY SHIN HA-NEE, KO SUK-HYUN [shin.hanee@joongang.co.kr]