SK Hynix, the world’s third-largest semiconductor maker by revenues, pledged to produce 1A nanometer DRAM and 176-layer 4D NAND Flash products with improved performance within a year.
The South Korean company said the moves would “raise cost competitiveness” in an already hyper-competitive market. Micron Technology, the fourth largest chipmaker, recently said it has reached volume shipment of its 1-alpha node DRAM after announcing last year that it had the first shipping 176-layer NAND.
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SK Hynix made the commitments during its fourth fiscal quarter 2020 earnings announcement on Jan. 2. It also plans to increase the proportion of high-value-added DRAM products such as HBM2E to meet the needs of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence.
For 2020, the company said it had 31.0 trillion Korean won ($28.6 billion) in revenues, an improvement of 18% over 2019. Fourth first quarter revenue was 7.9 trillion won ($7.1 billion), up by 15% year-over-year, but down 2% over the previous quarter. The company blamed the fourth quarter sequential reduction on falling prices and a weak dollar.
DRAM bit shipments increased by 11% sequentially, but the average selling price dropped 7%, while NAND Flash bit shipments rose 8% sequentially while the average selling price dropped 8%. The company said the memory market showed a “sluggish trend” in 2020 due to the global pandemic and intensifying trade disputes.
SK Hynix shares closed at 130,000 won ($116.480) on Tuesday Korean time while the six-month high was 138,000 won on Jan. 8.