Two Bites this Week
After the Chinese gut punch the Ai industry received this week, there was another impactful event that pointed toward China’s relentless push toward becoming a world-class player in the semiconductor space, despite the US government’s steps to keep China from competing. ChangXin Memory Technologies (pvt), China’s leading memory producer, has released its first 16Gb DDR5 chip (already produces DDR3L, DDR4, LPDDR4X, and LPDDR5). Earlier versions (G1 – G3) were produced on 23.8nm and 18nm nodes, or the equivalent of D2y and D1x generations. As DDR5 has surpassed DDR4 in terms of volume, this gives China there own DDR5 product that will compete against Samsung Electronics (005930.KS), SK Hynix (000660.KS), and Micron (MU).
The three non-Chinese DDR5 producers began mass production of DDR5 in 2021 and current products have a feature size between 12nm and 14nm, which gives them a three-year lead of CXMT. However CMXT was able to skip the 17nm node step to reduce development time and is able to give the product a higher bit density than both Samsung’s and SK Hynix’s products (Micron is slightly higher). Higher bit density allows for greater memory capacity without increasing the chip size. The CMTX chips were found in a teardown of a Chinese high-performance solid-state drive that is the first SSD to be able to store 20Gb/mm2 by stacking 16 CMXT DDR5 chips.
The three non-Chinese DDR5 producers began mass production of DDR5 in 2021 and current products have a feature size between 12nm and 14nm, which gives them a three-year lead of CXMT. However CMXT was able to skip the 17nm node step to reduce development time and is able to give the product a higher bit density than both Samsung’s and SK Hynix’s products (Micron is slightly higher). Higher bit density allows for greater memory capacity without increasing the chip size. The CMTX chips were found in a teardown of a Chinese high-performance solid-state drive that is the first SSD to be able to store 20Gb/mm2 by stacking 16 CMXT DDR5 chips.
We do not make the mistake if taking this event to mean that China’s home-grown memory industry has caught up with current supplier technology, but it does indicate that China continues to shorten the lead its competitors have, even considering the roadblocks that have been put in its way. Whie the semiconductor space represents a higher level of complexity compared to the display space, comparisons can be made, and earlier this week, the afront to the US dominance of the Ai world lends a bit more credibility to China’s overall efforts in technology. Sometimes when you poke the bear, it bites back.
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