Samsung confirms next-generation HBM4 memory is in fact Snowbolt – and reveals it plans to flood the market with precious AI memory amid growing competition with SK Hynix and Micron
Samsung has revealed that it expects to triple its production of HBM chips this year.
“Following the third-generation HBM2E and fourth-generation HBM3, which are already in mass production, we plan to mass-produce the 12-layer fifth-generation HBM and 32 gigabit-based 128 GB DDR5 products in the first half of the year. years,” said SangJoon Hwang, EVP and head of the DRAM Product and Technology Team at Samsung, speaking at Memcon 2024.
“With these products, we expect to expand our presence in high-performance, high-capacity memory in the AI era.”
Snow globe
Samsung plans a 2.9-fold increase in HBM chip production volume this year, compared to the 2.5-fold forecast previously announced at CES 2024. The company also shared a roadmap detailing future HBM production , forecasting a 13.8-fold increase in HBM shipments. 2026 compared to 2023.
Samsung used Memcon 2024 to demonstrate its HBM3E 12H chip – the industry’s first 12-stack HBM3E DRAM – which is currently in customer testing. This will see Micron’s 24GB 8H HBM3E enter mass production in the coming months.
According to The Korean Economic JournalSamsung also talked about its plans for HBM4 and its sixth-generation HBM chip, which the company has dubbed ‘Snowbolt’. Samsung says it plans to put the bufferdie, a control device, on the bottom layer of the stacked memory for greater efficiency. However, it did not provide any information about when that future generation of HBM will see the light of day.
Despite being the world’s largest memory chipmaker, Samsung has lagged behind arch-rival SK Hynix in the HBM chip segment, forcing the company to invest heavily in manufacturing a crucial component in the escalating AI race due to its superior processing speed.
However, SK Hynix is not going to make it easy for Samsung. The world’s second-largest memory chip manufacturer recently announced plans to build its largest-ever chip manufacturing facility at the Yongin Semiconductor Cluster in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea.