News

posted on 27 June 2008 15:22

Hynix and Samsung will work together to develop spin transfer torque magnetic random access memory (STT-MRAM) as a replacement for both non-volatile flash and DRAM. The state of South Korea is also putting funds into the program.

The South Korean Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy, stated: "For (South Korea's) continued leadership in the memory chip sector, Samsung and Hynix agree it is urgent to acquire a source of technology for next-generation memory chips." This is a national honour and prosperity thing aimed at ensuring the two South Korean firms have a role in the next-generation memory market and don't cede that market to Japanese firms.

Fujitsu, NEC and Toshiba are working together and spending $28.3m over the 2006 - 2010 period to build STT-MRAM chips and products. If Samsung and Hynix develop their owen technology they won't have to pay license royalty fees to the Japanese companies.

Hynix licensed STT-MRAM technology from Grandis earlier this year and is working with Grandis to develop STT-MRAM chips. It seems that the task is too big for Hynix and Grandis on their own.

Samsung and Hynix will together invest $9.46 million in the state-backed R&D program. (That doesn't seem like a lot of money.) This program had its beginnings in 2004 and is slated to last until 2011.

The companies, the world's two largest memory chip manufacturers, think that STT-MRAM chips could exceed NAND flash chip capacities.

More here.

^{[Paul Roberts, news editor.]}