Park Jung-ho, co-CEO and Vice Chairman at SK hynix Inc. today stated during an official government event that SK hynix is considering feasible plan to double its foundry capacity. Park said the Company will look into several strategic options such as equipment expansion at domestic sites and M&A. According to the SK hynix official, SK hynix will invest in 8-inch foundry business in order to support the development, mass production and global market expansion of domestic fabless companies. Also, the Company is expecting to expand the product portfolio and provide global customers with semiconductors oriented to various applications including mobile, home electronic appliances, and automotive.

Park's statement demonstrated his strong will that SK hynix will devote to stabilize the global semiconductor supply amid the global chip shortage, and also to support domestic fabless companies to further invigorate Korean semiconductor ecosystem. The semiconductor industry also expects that Park, who was recently appointed as co-CEO of SK hynix, might soon announce more specific investment plan such as M&A, as he was one of the leading executives in SK Telecom's acquisition of SK hynix. Park, who is a well-renowned M&A expert in SK Group, also participated in SK hynix's major investments such as its investment in Kioxia Corporation (formerly known as Toshiba Memory Corporation) and the acquisition of Intel's NAND and SSD business.

Demand for DRAM exceeded expectations in 1Q21 as the proliferation of WFH and distance education resulted in high demand for notebook computers against market headwinds, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. Also contributing to the increased DRAM demand was Chinese smartphone brands' ramp-up of component procurement while these companies, including OPPO, Vivo, and Xiaomi, attempted to seize additional market shares after Huawei's inclusion on the Entity List. Finally, DRAM demand from server manufacturers also saw a gradual recovery. Taken together, these factors led to higher-than-expected shipments from various DRAM suppliers in 1Q21 despite the frequent shortage of such key components as IC and passive components. On the other hand, DRAM prices also entered an upward trajectory in 1Q21 in accordance with TrendForce's previous forecasts. In light of the increases in both shipments and quotes, all DRAM suppliers posted revenue growths in 1Q21, and overall DRAM revenue for the quarter reached US$19.2 billion, an 8.7% growth QoQ.

Demand for PC, mobile, graphics, and special DRAM remains healthy in 2Q21. Furthermore, after two to three quarters of inventory reduction during which their DRAM demand was relatively sluggish, some server manufacturers have now kicked off a new round of procurement as they expect a persistent increase in DRAM prices. TrendForce therefore forecasts a significant QoQ increase in DRAM ASP in 2Q21. In conjunction with increased bit shipment, this price hike will likely drive total DRAM revenue for 2Q21 to increase by more than 20% QoQ.

SK hynix Inc. today announced financial results for its first quarter 2021 ended on March 31, 2021. The consolidated revenue of the first quarter 2021 was 8.494 trillion won while the operating profit amounted to 1.324 trillion won, and the net income 993 billion won. Operating margin for the quarter was 16% and net margin was 12%.

The Company made better results both QoQ and YoY in the first quarter as the semiconductor market conditions improved earlier this year. Although the first quarter is usually off-season of the semiconductor industry, the Company said that the market conditions improved as demand for memory products for PCs and mobiles increased. In addition, cost competitiveness has increased as yields of major products have improved. Through this, the revenue and the operating profit increased by 7% and 37%, respectively, compared to the previous quarter.

Today, we are getting a report coming from the South Korean press, stating that the country of South Korea has just given SK Hynix the green light to start building the mega factory complex. Being in the planning phase for a long time, the new mega factory is going to be located in Yongin, a city set 50 km south of the capital Seoul. The company expects to break ground with construction in Q4 of this year, and finish everything and start volume production of DRAM in 2025. When it comes to the size of the new mega factory, the plant is going to have an area of ​​4.15 million square meters.

The total cost of it will be about $106 billion worth of investment from SK Hynix, making all the recent fab construction plans look tiny compared to this massive investment. The mega factory complex would consist out of four fabs, where their total wafer per month output would be around 800,000. These foundries will be in charge of producing regular DRAM, and next-generation DRAM technologies like we have talked about just a few days ago. It remains to be seen what the company will come out with in the future, however, we are watching its moves closely.

On March 22nd, the CEO of SK Hynix, Seok-Hee Lee, gave a keynote speech to the IEEE International Reliability Physics Symposium (IRPS) and shared with experts a part of its plan for the future of SK Hynix products. The CEO took the stage and delivered some conceptual technologies that the company is working on right now. At the center of the show, two distinct products stood out - 3D NAND and DRAM. So far, the company has believed that its 3D NAND scaling was very limited and that it can push up to 500 layers sometime in the future before the limit is reached. However, according to the latest research, SK Hynix will be able to produce 600-layer 3D NAND technology in the distant future.

So far, the company has managed to manufacture and sample 512Gb 176-layer 3D NAND chips, so the 600-layer solutions are still far away. Nonetheless, it is a possibility that we are looking at. Before we reach that layer number, there are various problems needed to be solved so the technology can work. According to SK Hynix, "the company introduced the atomic layer deposition (ALD) technology to further improve the cell property of efficiently storing electric charges and exporting them when needed, while developing technology to maintain uniform electric charges over a certain amount through the innovation of dielectric materials. In addition to this, to solve film stress issues, the mechanical stress levels of films is controlled and the cell oxide-nitride (ON) material is being optimized. To deal with the interference phenomenon between cells and charge loss that occur when more cells are stacked at a limited height, SK Hynix developed the isolated-charge trap nitride (isolated-CTN) structure to enhance reliability."

With Samsung, YMTC, SK Hynix, and Intel leading the charge, NAND Flash suppliers will maintain an aggressive effort to expand their production capacities throughout 2Q21, during which NAND Flash bit output will likely increase by nearly 10% QoQ, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. On the other hand, orders from PC OEMs and Chinese smartphone brands since 1Q21, as well as recovering procurement activities from clients in the data center segment during 2Q21, will generate upward momentum propelling NAND Flash bit demand. Furthermore, buyers are actively stocking up on finished products, such as SSDs and eMMC, due to persistently limited NAND Flash controller supply. TrendForce therefore expects NAND Flash contract prices to increase by an average of 3-8% QoQ in 2Q21 after experiencing a 5-10% decline QoQ in 1Q21. In particular, as Samsung's Line S2 fab in Austin has yet to resume full operation after the Texas winter storm, the supply of NAND Flash controllers going forward may be at risk, and Samsung's ability to manufacture client SSDs will be further constrained as a result. In light of these factors, TrendForce is not ruling out the possibility that NAND Flash contract prices may increase by even more than current forecasts.

SK hynix Inc announced that it has started mass-production of 18 GB (gigabyte) LPDDR5 mobile DRAM, which offers the largest capacity in the industry. This product will be equipped in premium smartphones to support an optimal environment for games with high resolution image and also high quality videos. SK hynix also expects that application will continue expanding to include the latest technologies, including ultra-high-performance camera applications and artificial intelligence (AI).

"This product will improve the processing speed and image quality by expanding the data temporary storage space, as the capacity increases compared to the previous 16 GB product," an official from the company said. The new product runs at up to 6,400 Mbps (megabits-per-second), around 20% faster than the mobile DRAM (LPDDR5 with 5,500 Mbps) for existing smartphones, a data rate that is capable of transferring ten 5 GB FHD (Full-HD) movies per second.

Global DRAM revenue reached US$17.65 billion, a 1.1% increase YoY, in 4Q20, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. For the most part, this growth took place because Chinese smartphone brands, including Oppo, Vivo, and Xiaomi, expanded their procurement activities for components in order to seize the market shares made available after Huawei was added to the Entity List by the U.S. Department of Commerce. These procurement activities in turn provided upward momentum for DRAM suppliers' bit shipment. However, clients in the server segment were still in the middle of inventory adjustments during this period, thereby placing downward pressure on DRAM prices. As a result, revenues of most DRAM suppliers, except for Micron, remained somewhat unchanged in 4Q20 compared to 3Q20. Micron underwent a noticeable QoQ decline in 4Q20 (which Micron counts as its fiscal 1Q21), since Micron had fewer work weeks during this period compared to the previous quarter.

Yes, you are reading that title correctly. Today we got ahold of information that DDR3 prices are going to skyrocket by as much as 40-50% this year! Despite DDR4 being present for seven years (since 2014), which is a lot in the world of tech, DDR3 is still thriving. Used in a wide range of devices like IoT, older servers, and long time running machines that need maintenance for decades. The DDR3 has been manufactured by SK Hynix, Samsung, and Micron, however, as technology moved on, these companies began the migration to the newer DDR4 standard. Even DDR5 exists today and it is currently manufactured.

So why is DDR3 soaring in value? It is because of the increased scarcity of this memory. SK Hynix has stopped the production of 2 Gb modules, leaving only the 4 Gb modules in production. Samsung has cut down the capacity from 60,000 wafers of DDR3 memory modules per month to just 20,000. This has caused the price of 2 Gb and 4 Gb modules to rise already as much as 30%. Despite the age of 14 years, DDR3 is still widely used in many systems. And because of that, the scarcity is making the price of the current memory increase. The price is expected to rise through the whole year and it could reach a 50% increase.

SK hynix Inc. held a completion ceremony for its new fabrication plant M16 at headquarter located in Icheon, Gyeonggi-do, South Korea. Under the theme of "We Do Technology: Opening the Happiness", the ceremony was held as SK Group's internal event in order to adhere to the COVID-19 containment measures.

A total of 16 personnel including SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-Won and SK Group Senior Vice Chairman Chey JaeWon, SK SUPEX Council Chairman Cho DaeSik, SK hynix Vice Chairman Park Jung-ho, SK Holdings President & CEO Jang DongHyun, SK hynix CEO Seok-Hee Lee, and SK hynix Lead Independent Director Ha Yung Ku attended the on-site ceremony, along other employees and partner companies' members joined through live video conference.

SK hynix Inc. today announced financial results for its fiscal year 2020 ended on December 31, 2020. The consolidated revenue of fiscal year 2020 was 31.9 trillion won while the operating profit amounted to 5.013 trillion won, and the net income 4.759 trillion won. Operating margin of for the year was 16%, and net margin was 15%.

"Due to the global pandemic and the intensifying trade disputes last year, the memory market showed sluggish trend," said Kevin (Jongwon) Noh, Executive Vice President and Head of Corporate Center (CFO) at SK hynix. "In the meantime, the Company stably mass-produced its main products such as 1Znm DRAM and 128-layer NAND Flash." Noh also explained, "The Company expanded its server market share based on its quality competitiveness, which resulted in an increase in the revenue and the operating profit by 18% and 84%, respectively, compared to the previous year."

Research and development spending by semiconductor companies worldwide is forecast to grow 4% in 2021 to $71.4 billion after rising 5% in 2020 to a record high of $68.4 billion, according to IC Insights' new 2021 edition of The McClean Report—A Complete Analysis and Forecast of the Integrated Circuit Industry. Total R&D spending by semiconductor companies is expected to rise by a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 5.8% between 2021 and 2025 to $89.3 billion.

When the world was hit by the Covid-19 virus health crisis in 2020, wary semiconductor suppliers kept a lid on R&D spending increases, even though total semiconductor industry revenue grew by a surprising 8% in the year despite the economic fallout from the deadly pandemic. Semiconductor R&D expenditures as a percentage of worldwide industry sales slipped to 14.2% in 2020 compared to 14.6% in 2019, when research and development spending declined 1% and total semiconductor revenue fell 12%. Figure 1 plots semiconductor R&D spending levels and the spending-to-sales ratios over the past two decades and IC Insights' forecast through 2025.

The percentage distribution of 2021 NAND Flash bit demand by application currently shows that client SSD accounts for 31%, enterprise SSD 20%, eMMC/UFS 41%, and NAND wafer 8%, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. TrendForce expects NAND Flash ASP to undergo QoQ declines throughout 2021, since the number of NAND suppliers far exceeds DRAM suppliers, and the bit supply remains high. As Samsung, YMTC, SK Hynix, and Intel actively expand their NAND Flash bit output in 1Q21, the oversupply situation in the industry will become more severe, with a forecasted 6% QoQ increase in NAND Flash bit output and a 10-15% QoQ decline in NAND Flash ASP in 1Q21.

The DRAM market exhibits a healthier and more balanced supply/demand relationship compared with the NAND Flash market because of its oligopolistic structure, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. The percentage distribution of DRAM supply bits by application currently shows that PC DRAM accounts for 13%, server DRAM 34%, mobile DRAM 40%, graphics DRAM 5%, and consumer DRAM (or specialty DRAM) 8%. Looking ahead to 1Q21, the DRAM market by then will have gone through an inventory adjustment period of slightly more than two quarters. Memory buyers will also be more willing to stock up because they want to reduce the risk of future price hikes. Therefore, DRAM prices on the whole will be constrained from falling further. The overall ASP of DRAM products is now forecasted to stay generally flat or slightly up for 1Q21.

SK hynix Inc. announced the completion of developing the industry's most multilayered 176-layer 512 Gigabit (Gb) Triple-Level Cell (TLC) 4D NAND flash. The Company provided the samples to controller companies last month to make a solution product.

SK hynix has been promoting 4D technology from the 96-layer NAND flash products that combine Charge Trap Flash (CTF) with high-integrated Peri. Under Cell (PUC) technology. The new 176-layer NAND flash is the third generation 4D product that secures the industry's best number of chips per wafer. This allows the bit productivity to be improved by 35% compared to the previous generation with the differentiated cost competitiveness. The read speed of cell increased by 20% over the previous generation adopting 2-division cell array selection technology. The data transfer speed also has been improved by 33% to 1.6 Gbps adopting speed-up technology without increasing the number of processes.

Total NAND Flash revenue reached US$14.5 billion in 3Q20, a 0.3% increase QoQ, while total NAND Flash bit shipment rose by 9% QoQ, but the ASP fell by 9% QoQ, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. The market situation in 3Q20 can be attributed to the rising demand from the consumer electronics end as well as the recovering smartphone demand before the year-end peak sales season. Notably, in the PC market, the rise of distance education contributed to the growing number and scale of Chromebook tenders, but the increase in the demand for Chromebook devices has not led to a significant increase in NAND Flash consumption because storage capacity is rather limited for this kind of notebook computer. Moreover, clients in the server and data center segments had aggressively stocked up on components and server barebones during 2Q20 due to worries about the impact of the pandemic on the supply chain. Hence, their inventories reached a fairly high level by 3Q20. Clients are now under pressure to control and reduce their inventories during this second half of the year. With them scaling back procurement, the overall NAND Flash demand has also weakened, leading to a downward turn in the contract prices of most NAND Flash products.

SK hynix Inc. today announced financial results for its third quarter 2020 ended on September 30, 2020. The consolidated revenue of third quarter 2020 was 8.129 trillion won while the operating profit amounted to 1.3 trillion won, and the net income 1.078 trillion won. Operating margin for the quarter was 16% and net margin was 13%.

Despite the Company saw the recovery of mobile DRAM demand in the quarter, both the revenue and operating profit decreased by 6% and 33% quarter-over-quarter (QoQ) respectively, as the server DRAM and SSD demands weakened, and the overall semiconductor memory price flow turned downwards in the quarter. For DRAM, SK hynix proactively responded to rising demands of mobile and graphics DRAM, and the expansion of consumer electronics DRAM demand as well. As a result, in spite of decreased server DRAM demand, the Company's DRAM bit shipment in the quarter still increased by 4% QoQ. However, due to the unfavorable price of server DRAM and other certain DRAM products, the average selling price decreased by 7% QoQ.

SK hynix Inc. announced to launch world's first DDR5 DRAM. It is a high-speed and high-density product optimized for Big Data, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and machine learning (ML) as a next generation standard of DRAM. Since SK hynix announced the development of World's First 16 Gigabit (Gb) DDR5 DRAM on November 2018, the Company has provided its major partners including Intel with sample products, and has completed various tests and verification of its functions and compatibility. This will allow SK hynix to provide its customers with the products once the DDR5 market becomes active.

In the meantime, SK hynix has conducted joint-operation of on-site lab, system-level test, and simulation with System-on-Chip) (SoC) manufacturers to verify the functions of DDR5. Also, the Company validated compatibility of its DDR5 and the major components on DRAM module including register clock driver) (RCD), which affect DRAM performance, and power management integrated circuit) (PMIC). Through these verifications, SK hynix has been collaborating closely with its global partners.

SK hynix Inc.announced that Gauss Labs Inc. was founded to lead manufacturing innovation through industrial AI solutions. Gauss Labs will start its Korean office later this month right after having established its headquarters in Silicon Valley, U.S. last month. SK hynix is the sole investor of its initial capital of $55 million through 2022.

SK Group has been promoting various types of AI businesses with its affiliates. "We should utilize innovative technologies such as AI and digital transformation (DT) to create social value, expand our market, and help our customers pursue happiness," said Mr. Tae-won Chey, the Chairman of SK Group at SK Icheon Forum in August last year. "If we fail to utilize innovative technologies, we cannot guarantee the future of SK." Gauss Labs is the first independent corporation from SK Group specializing in AI.

Gauss Labs initially aims to revolutionize semiconductor manufacturing through innovative AI technologies by utilizing an enormous amount of data generated at SK hynix's manufacturing sites. Through these technologies, SK hynix plans to make its overall manufacturing operations, including process control, yield prediction, equipment maintenance, defect inspection and fault prevention, more efficient and more intelligent.

Ever since the Trump administration imposed sanctions against Huawei to stop it from purchasing parts from third-party vendors to bypass the ban announced back in May, some vendors continued to supply the company. So it seems like some Korean manufacturers will be joining the doings of the US government, and apply restrictions to Huawei. According to the reports of South Korean media outlets, Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix will be joining the efforts of the US government and the Trump administration to impose sanctions against Chinese technology giant - Huawei.

It is reported that on September 15th, both Samsung and SK Hynix will stop any shipments to Huawei, where Samsung already stopped efforts for creating any new shipments. SK Hynix is said to continue shipping DRAM and NAND Flash products until September 14th, a day before the new sanctions are applied. Until the 14th, Huawei will receive some additional chips from SK Hynix. And it is exactly SK Hynix who is said to be a big loser here. It is estimated that 41.2% of SK Hynix's H1 2020 revenue came from China, most of which was memory purchased for Huawei phones and tablets. If the company loses Huawei as a customer, it would mean that the revenue numbers will be notably lower.

The NAND Flash industry benefitted from strong demand for PCs and servers in 2Q20 as the COVID-19 pandemic caused a demand surge for cloud services and technologies that are related to working from home, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. This, in turn, kept demand high for SSDs. However, the smartphone and consumer electronics markets had not recovered from the impact of the pandemic. The demand for these products therefore declined compared to the previous quarter. In 2Q20, total NAND Flash bit shipment and ASP both experienced a minor increase of about 3% QoQ, while NAND Flash revenue reached US$14.5 billion, a 6.5% increase QoQ.

The last cyclical upturn in DRAM contract prices began at the start of 2020 and was led by server DRAM, according to TrendForce's latest investigations. In 2Q20, the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic shocked the global economy, but OEMs maintained or even stepped up procurement of components because they feared disruptions in the supply chain. As a result, DRAM suppliers' bit shipments surpassed expectations for the quarter, in turn widening the overall increase in DRAM ASP and raising the global DRAM revenue by 15.4% QoQ in 2Q20 to US$17.1 billion.

Nevertheless, TrendForce indicates that server OEMs are now carrying a rather high level of DRAM inventory after aggressively stocking up for two consecutive quarters. At the same time, customers of enterprise servers are holding back on procurement because the economic outlook is getting bleaker and more uncertain. Since server DRAM has the unique role of leading cyclical changes, this category is going to be first to experience price drop in the next downturn and thereby pull prices down for other types of DRAM products. As such, TrendForce forecasts at best a flattening of product shipments and decrease in DRAM prices in 3Q20, with DRAM suppliers suffering a decline in profitability.

According to the latest DigiTimes Research report, it is said that Korean memory makers have experienced a surge in chip output value. Korean memory manufacturers are Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, which both have seen a massive growth of 22.1% on a yearly basis and 13.9% sequentially in the second quarter of 2020. This is no small feat as the demand for memory in the smartphone industry has been slowed in that period due to the COVID pandemic, however, it was offset by strong demand from servers and notebooks. When the output of Korean memory giants is fused, Samsung and SK Hynix had combined revenue of KRW22.9 trillion or about 20.8 billion USD. The demand for memory is expected to continue its growth due to the 5G headset market.

SK hynix Inc., a global semiconductor supplier based in Korea, announced today the release of its newest PCIe SSD: the SK hynix Gold P31. The latest edition is the world's first 128-layer NAND flash-based consumer SSD and the company's first consumer-facing PCIe SSD launched in the United States under the SK hynix brand.

The Gold P31 is intended for all PC users with a particular focus on gamers, designers, and content creators. The drive supports the PCIe NVMe interface based on 4D NAND flash technology and is now available for purchase in 1 TB and 500 GB capacities on Amazon U.S. The Gold P31 offers best-in-class read speeds of up to 3,500 MB/s and write speeds of up to 3,200 MB/s. The drive is a reliable choice for gamers whose PCs must support long hours of play, as well as professional creators and designers for whom performance and stability is essential. The Gold P31's reliability has been tested and validated through 1,000 hours of high-temperature operating life tests (HTOL) with mean time between failures (MTBF) reaching 1.5 million hours. The SSD also comes with a five-year warranty.

SiFive, Inc., the leading provider of commercial RISC-V processor IP and silicon solutions, today announced it raised $61 million in a Series E round led by SK hynix, joined by new investor Prosperity7 Ventures, with additional funding from existing investors, Sutter Hill Ventures, Western Digital Capital, Qualcomm Ventures, Intel Capital, Osage University Partners, and Spark Capital.

"Global demand for storage and memory in the data center is increasing as AI-powered business intelligence and data processing growth continues", said Youjong Kang, VP of Growth Strategy, SK hynix. "SiFive is well-positioned to grow with opportunities created from data center, enterprise, storage and networking requirements for workload-focused processor IP."