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Did SK hynix Beat Samsung to the 8Gb LPDDR4?

Every so often something very strange happens that puzzles The Memory Guy. On December 29 (or Dec. 30 in Seoul) something odd occurred.

I received two e-mails, one from SK hynix at 3:55 PM Pacific Time, and one from Samsung exactly one hour later. Both were press releases.

The SK hynix release was titled: “SK Hynix Developed the World’s First Next Generation Mobile Memory LPDDR4”. It announced that the company is sampling its 20nm-class 8Gb LPDDR4 DRAM to customers.

The Samsung release was Continue reading “Did SK hynix Beat Samsung to the 8Gb LPDDR4?”

Rambus and Micron Sign License Agreement

The following is excerpted from an Objective Analysis Alert that can be downloaded from the company’s website.

Rambus and Micron announced on Tuesday that they have signed a patent cross license agreement. Micron receives rights to Rambus IC patents, including memories. Both Micron and Elpida products will be covered. The companies have thus settled all outstanding patent and antitrust claims in their 13-year court battle.

Micron will make royalty payments to Rambus of up to $10 million per quarter over the next seven years, totaling $280 million, after which Micron will receive a perpetual, paid-up license.

Rambus and Micron both have Continue reading “Rambus and Micron Sign License Agreement”

Why Facebook Can’t Get its Dream Memory Chip

During the Flash Memory Summit last August Facebook’s Jason Taylor, Director of Capacity Engineering and Analysis, asked in his keynote speech for a flash chip with dramatically lower cost per gigabyte, saying that he would readily give up speed and endurance to achieve this lower cost. Taylor called this “Cold Flash” and said he was willing to use something that was “Write Once, Read Many” or WORM for data that was unlikely to change over its lifetime. He said this was Facebook’s “Ask of the Industry.”

That same sentiment was echoed yesterday at Samsung’s Memory Solutions Forum by eBay’s Distinguished Engineer and Technologist Roark Hilomen, who said that he could live with 1/3rd the number of writes that normal flash supports as long as he could get it for 1/4 the price.

Unfortunately this is simply not possible.

Let’s do a little math to understand Continue reading “Why Facebook Can’t Get its Dream Memory Chip”

Micron Samples Hybrid Memory Cube

Today Micron Technology announced that it is sampling the Hybrid Memory Cube (HMC) a DRAM packaging technology that it has been working on with the HMC Consortium.

Micron has been pushing to rapidly advance the HMC’s development and seems to have reached this point in an impressively brief time, given the complexity of the technology. It has only been two years since the first public appearance of the HMC at the 2011 Intel Developer Forum.

Some pretty advanced technology was used to make this product. DRAM processes are not very good at Continue reading “Micron Samples Hybrid Memory Cube”

Samsung’s View on Charge Trap Flash

At the Flash Memory Summit yesterday ES Jung, PhD, EVP & GM for the Samsung R&D Center, explained the inner workings of Samsung’s new V-NAND vertical NAND flash technology. I will shortly be writing a series to explain what a 3D NAND is since there is little on the web that gives clear details about the technology.

One key attribute of most 3D NAND approaches is the use of a charge trapping layer. This has to do with the difficulty of manufacturing sideways floating gates.

Dr Jung delighted the show’s audience by explaining that a standard floating gate is like Continue reading “Samsung’s View on Charge Trap Flash”

Micron NAND Reaches 16nm

Micron has announced that it is sampling a new 128Gb NAND flash chip based upon a 16nm process, with production slated for the fourth quarter. To The Memory Guy’s knowledge this is the tightest process available.

The company, with its partner Intel, gained a lead with its 20nm process generation through its use of a Hi-k tunnel dielectric, a new material that replaces more conventional silicon dioxide layer with a new material (Micron won’t say what) that yields the same capacitance with a thinner layer. This has become very important with today’s tight processes because of issues of inter-cell interference.

Other NAND makers are migrating to Continue reading “Micron NAND Reaches 16nm”

SanDisk & Toshiba Move to Next Process Node

SanDisk and Toshiba, in separate announcements, both today disclosed their next-generation process technology.

The companies introduced their new “1y” processing node that, according to SanDisk, produces 19nm x 19.5nm cell, versus the earlier “19nm” process (or “1x”) that used a 19nm x 26nm cell.

The graphic for this post (click to enlarge) was presented during SanDisk’s May 5th Analyst Day and compares the 24nm process to the 19 x 26nm process, moving to the 19 x 19nm process, and eventually to “1z” which neither company is yet revealing. After the 1z process SanDisk believes Continue reading “SanDisk & Toshiba Move to Next Process Node”

Hybrid Memory Cube Making Progress

On Tuesday the HMC Consortium (that’s short for “Hybrid Memory Cube”) announced that members have agreed upon a specification. The consortium has been moving rapidly, meeting its targets despite the revolutionary nature of the interface.

As a reminder, this technology stacks multiple DRAMs in a single package with a logic chip at the base of the stack that performs all the signalling to the rest of the system. Signals between the DRAMs and logic chip use through-silicon vias (TSVs) as interconnections. This allows the technology to deliver 15 times the performance of DDR3 at only 30% of the power consumption. The Memory Guy first posted about the HMC in late 2011.

The consortium explains that the HMC interface already has 100 adopters, and that a few Continue reading “Hybrid Memory Cube Making Progress”

Why Most NAND Rankings Ignore SanDisk

Every so often I run into someone who asks about the discrepancy between various analysts’ NAND market share rankings and SanDisk’s shipments. After all, SanDisk is a leading producer of flash memory and has captive manufacture through its joint venture with Toshiba. Yet, most market share rankings leave SanDisk out.

What’s going on here?

Owing to a long-standing convention SanDisk’s NAND chips aren’t counted since they are sold as “Systems” (with a controller.) The World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) set that rule up, and most analysts Continue reading “Why Most NAND Rankings Ignore SanDisk”

Is there a NAND Shortage? Not quite.

The trade press has recently carried reports of a NAND shortage which The Memory Guy finds to be very premature. True, NAND prices are not at their lowest point – today NAND can be found for 38 cents per gigabyte, up from a low of 31 cents in July. But does this constitute a shortage? No, not really.

One of the key indicators of a shortage is a crossover between spot and contract pricing – during an oversupply spot pricing is lower than contract pricing since OEMs and suppliers both place excess product on the market and compete on price. During a shortage the opposite is true – suppliers don’t have any Continue reading “Is there a NAND Shortage? Not quite.”