BEIJING — ChangXin Memory Technologies, China's largest DRAM maker, said it has made meaningful progress in developing the 4F² cell structure, considered a key next-generation DRAM technology, and promised to unveil a product using it before the end of this year.
Chao Kanyu, CXMT's chief executive, said the company has laid the groundwork for implementing the 4F² architecture by developing a vertical surrounding gate, or VSG, transistor that can address long-standing problems such as current leakage, according to a report on the 12th by Securities Daily, a Chinese state-run newspaper. Speaking at the fourth Integrated Circuit and Chiplet Conference held in Shanghai on the 9th and 10th, Chao said CXMT would launch a DDR5 registered memory module, or RDIMM, for servers using the technology by year-end.
The 4F² structure shrinks the area of a memory cell, the smallest unit that stores data in a DRAM chip. It can reduce cell area by about 33% compared with the 6F² structure that currently dominates the industry, allowing a chip of the same size to store more data. SK hynix (000660.KS) disclosed its 4F² roadmap last year, and Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) is pursuing a plan to apply the structure to sub-10-nanometer DRAM and begin mass production, targeting 2028. Judging by the announced timelines alone, CXMT would be about two years ahead of Samsung Electronics.
CXMT's choice of server DRAM rather than low-power DRAM, known as LPDDR, as the first product to use the technology also signals a direct challenge to South Korean chipmakers. "DDR5 RDIMM has to support servers running 24 hours a day and must avoid errors during high-speed data transmission, so the technical requirements are higher," a CXMT official said. "Choosing it as the first application of 4F² technology means we are taking on the very high technical and engineering barriers in server memory head-on."
Still, industry officials in South Korea said it is difficult to conclude that CXMT has pulled ahead on technology. The scope of the new technology's application may be limited, and it remains uncertain whether the company can succeed in large-scale mass production. "Applying a new technology and securing a stable mass-production system are separate issues," one industry official said. "With only the information disclosed so far, there are limits to verifying the specific level of technology, such as the process or yields." Another official said: "Being a generation ahead in technology does not mean the actual memory performance is superior. What matters is the maturity of the technology and real performance gains, not the speed of development."