Samsung Starts Mass Producing Industry’s First 32-Layer 3D V-NAND Flash Memory, its 2nd Generation V-NAND Offering

V-NAND flash memory using 32 vertically stacked cell layers Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., the world leader in advanced memory technology, today announced that it has begun mass producing the industry's first three-dimensional (3D) V-NAND flash memory using 32 vertically stacked cell layers, which is its second generation V-NAND offering. Samsung's 32-layer 3D V-NAND – also referred to as Vertical NAND– requires a higher level of design technology to stack the cell arrays than the previous 24-layer V-NAND, yet delivers much greater production efficiency because Samsung can use essentially the same equipment it used for production of the first generation V-NAND. In addition, Samsung has just launched a line-up of premium SSDs based on its 2nd generation V-NAND flash memory with 128 gigabyte (GB), 256GB, 512GB and 1TB storage options. After introducing 3D V-NAND-based SSDs to data centers last year, Samsung is now extending its V-NAND SSD line-up to high-end PC applications, in expanding its market base. "We increased the availability of our 3D V-NAND by introducing an extensive V-NAND SSD line-up that covers the PC market in addition to data centers," said Young-Hyun Jun, executive vice president, memory sales and marketing, Samsung Electronics. "Look for us to provide a consistent, timely supply of high-performance, high-density V-NAND SSDs as well as core V-NAND chips for IT customers globally, contributing to fast market adoption of 3D NAND technology." The new 3D V-NAND-based SSDs have approximately twice the endurance for writing data and consume 20 percent less power, compared to planar (2D) MLC NAND-based drives. Later this year, Samsung will introduce additional premium 3D-based SSDs based on this 2nd generation V-NAND memory with even higher reliability and higher-density in satisfying a diversity of customer needs. According to a recent research report by Gartner, the global memory market is expected to grow from US $75.5 billion in revenues to approximately US $79.7 billion in 2017, while its NAND flash portion will continue to rapidly increase to reach a more than 50 percent share or about US $44.6 billion in 2017.