Toshiba and SanDisk Celebrate the Opening of Fab 5 300mm NAND Flash Memory Plant

[btarunr]

Toshiba Corporation and SanDisk Corporation today celebrated the opening of Fab 5, the third 300mm wafer NAND fabrication facility at Toshiba's Yokkaichi Operations in Mie Prefecture, Japan.

Consumer demand for smartphones, tablets and other electronic devices continues to fuel strong global demand for NAND flash memory. Toshiba began the construction of Fab 5 in July 2010, and the new facility, equipped with manufacturing equipment funded by Toshiba and SanDisk, started volume production in July 2011. Fab 5 currently uses 24 nanometer (nm) process technology and its first wafer outs will be in August. In time, the fab will transition to more advanced process generations, starting with recently announced 19nm technology, the world's smallest, most advanced process node.



Fab 5 incorporates advanced earthquake-absorbing structures and integrates multiple power compensation techniques for protection against unexpected disruptions. LED lighting and power-saving manufacturing equipment will support the fab in securing Toshiba's goal of 12 percent less CO2 emissions than Fab 4. A wafer transportation system links the facility with Fabs 3 and 4 to support efficient manufacturing.

Flash Forward, Ltd., a joint venture between Toshiba and SanDisk established in September 2010 (50.1 percent owned by Toshiba and 49.9 percent by SanDisk), funded the advanced manufacturing equipment within the fab.

Outline of Fab 5 at Yokkaichi Operations
Structure of building: 2-Story steel frame concrete, five floors
Building area: Approximately 38,000m2
Floor area: Approximately 187,000m2
Start of construction: July 2010
Building completion: March 2011
Start of volume production: July 2011

Outline of Toshiba's Yokkaichi Operations
Location: 800 Yamanoisshiki-cho, Yokkaichi, Mie Prefecture
Established: January 1992
General Manager: Koji Sato
Employees: Approximately 4,400
(as of end of March 2011, regular employees only for Toshiba)
Total site area: Approximately 436,800m2
Total floor area: Approximately 647,000m2

Outline of Flash Forward, Ltd.
Location: 800 Yamanoisshiki-cho, Yokkaichi, Mie Prefecture
Established: September 2010
President and CEO: Hideyuki Kobayashi
Holding: Toshiba: 50.1%, SanDisk: 49.9%

SanDisk's operations in Yokkaichi include more than 300 employees under the leadership of SanDisk Japan President and General Manager, Dr. Atsuyoshi Koike.

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[micropage7]

wow we are going to 19nm?
its pretty fast from 40, to 32 then 19
smaller one means more complicated, high tech and it may lead to higher fault ratio

 

[Frick]

smaller one means more complicated, high tech and it may lead to higher fault ratio

It will but when the technology is mature you still get more chips on the same size of material so it's cheaper anyway.

 

[LAN_deRf_HA]

I'm sure either the controllers will get another needless yet costly speed bump and or the 19nm flash will have worse yields. One way or another I'm not expecting a price drop once this all comes together.

 

[Velvet Wafer]

19nm? how many write cycles will this have, until beeing unusable? 1000?
i guess next gen controllers will have features that look like magic to us, to be able to use an SSD for more than a year... durawrite 3 will have to be really efficient

 

[MikeMurphy]

I'll buy an expensive SSD the moment they achieve unlimited writes. Until then, they are going in the wrong direction with these smaller processes, but its quite necessary to remain competitive on price.

 

[Fourstaff]

I'll buy an expensive SSD the moment they achieve unlimited writes. Until then, they are going in the wrong direction with these smaller processes, but its quite necessary to remain competitive on price.

You will not be able to have unlimited writes, only effectively unlimited. But given current technologies, I think the SSD you use for daily life will become obsolete before the estimated write limit is reached, so to me its a moot point. Given that, I think 1000 write cycle is "enough", and hence they should focus on the price competition and the smaller process.

 

[Velvet Wafer]

I'll buy an expensive SSD the moment they achieve unlimited writes. Until then, they are going in the wrong direction with these smaller processes, but its quite necessary to remain competitive on price.

Unlimited writes are technologically impossible when employing flash, they would need to use a wholly different form of non-volatile, but fast, memory device.

Also, how long do you think, you will use an SSD?
The Vertex 3 has only 3000 writes per flash cell, and its Durawrite 2 technology already manages to give it about 10 years lifetime (theoretically)...
lets be realistic, and half that,as that does not include eventual controller failure, and youre still at 5 years.... an amount of time, in which a lot of better and faster stuff is released, that your SSD will be slow Junk, by the end of it.

What i fear, is just, that if you take 1/3rd (1000 writes instead of 3000) of 5 years,with this 19nm flash, you end up with roughly 1.5 years of lifetime, and that hardly is enough, for it to be useable... remembers me of my old indilinx, that roughly had about a year of lifetime, till its inevitable death!