China to produce 3D NAND chips as early as end-2017

Yangtze River Storage Technology (YRST) will start operating China's first 12-inch fab for the manufacture of NAND flash and DRAM memory at the end of 2016, and is expected to produce the region's first homegrown 3D NAND flash memory a year later, according to industry sources.

YRST will be able to make 32-layer 3D NAND flash chips as early as end-2017, said the sources.

Construction of YRST's 12-inch fab will be in three phases, with investment totaling US$24 billion, the sources indicated. The company will complete the first-phase construction at the end of 2016, followed by the second phase in 2018 and the third phase in 2019, the sources said.

The target production capacity at YRST's 12-inch fab is set at 300,000 wafers monthly, the sources noted. The facility will also be engaged in the manufacture of DRAM memory, and could play a role in Tsinghua Unigroup's planned strategic alliance with Micron Technology, the sources said.

YRST was formed with goverment subsidies and investments from several government-owned groups, and built based on Wuhan Xinxin Semiconductor Manufacturing's (XMC) 12-inch IC R&D and manufacturing capability and "continue to develop XMC's presence in the memory-chip market," XMC disclosed in August. XMC added it has become YRST's wholly-owned subsidiary since 2016.

In fact, YRST took over XMC's role as China's main production base for DRAM and NAND flash memory, industry sources identified. XMC is now in charge of making China's homegrown NOR flash as well as logic chips, with monthly capacity of around 30,000 12-inch wafers.

YRST will use Spansion's technology to produce 3D NAND chips based on a license agreement between Spansion and XMC, the sources said.

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