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YMTC is developing an advanced chip packaging technology

known

as through-silicon via

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YMTC's new Wuhan facility may produce DRAM chips

By Che Pan and Fanny Potkin

BEIJING, Sept 25 (Reuters) - China's top flash memory

chipmaker Yangtze Memory Technologies Co (YMTC) is planning to

expand into manufacturing DRAM chips including advanced versions

that are used to make artificial intelligence chipsets, three

people with knowledge of the matter said.

The move by the state-backed chipmaker underscores China's

growing urgency to boost its capability to manufacture advanced

chips after the U.S. expanded export controls in December to

restrict Beijing's access to high-bandwidth memory (HBM), a

specialised form of DRAM used to make AI chipsets.

The restriction has since made the availability of HBM chips

more pressing matter for China's vast AI chip industry where

tech giants such as Huawei and ByteDance are developing their

own AI chips, industry sources and analysts have said.

YMTC is developing an advanced chip packaging technology

known as through-silicon via (TSV), which is used to stack

dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) to produce HBM chips, two of

the people said.

They declined to be named because the information is not

public.

HBM chips are mainly produced by U.S.-based Micron,

South Korea's SK Hynix ( HXSCF ) and Samsung Electronics ( SSNLF )

and used to make AI chipsets that the likes of

Nvidia ( NVDA ) and AMD sell.

In China, YMTC's main rival CXMT is already developing HBM

chips.

YMTC is also considering allocating part of a new facility

it is building in Wuhan to producing DRAM chips, one of the

people said.

Earlier this month, YMTC established a new entity to build a

third chip factory in Wuhan, with a registered capital base of

20.7 billion yuan ($2.9 billion), according to data from

corporate registry data provider Qichacha.

YMTC didn't respond to a request for comment.

Reuters was not able to establish what the new fab's planned

monthly capacity would be or how much of it would be allocated

for DRAM production.

YMTC's two existing fabs in Wuhan, which have been focusing

on NAND chips, are capable of producing 160,000 12-inch wafers

per month as of end-2024 and are expected to expand its capacity

by 65,000 wafers this year, according to a research note by

Morgan Stanley.

YMTC, which was added to the U.S. Entity list in 2022, has

played a crucial role in China's drive for self-sufficiency in

flash memory chips, for which the country had largely relied on

imports from South Korea, Japan, and the U.S.

The company is owned by a namesake state-backed holding

entity.

(Reporting by Che Pan and Fanny Potkin; Editing by Miyoung Kim

and Lincoln Feast.)