Supply Chain Hurdles Stall CXMT HBM3 Market Entry and Transition From Research to Production Status
The high bandwidth memory expansion plan of China experiences major delays because Changxin Memory Technologies needs to change its main memory product from research status into production status. According to recent reporting from ZDNet Korea, the firm is failing to secure the necessary volume of components and raw materials required to launch its fourth generation HBM3 product. The company changed its internal plans because it initially predicted that commercial operations would begin by this year.
The manufacturer has successfully established its market position through DDR5 and LPDDR5X specification deployments, but HBM3 requires two distinct memory systems which present much greater difficulty for its development team. The Changxin project remains in its testing stage while SK Hynix, Samsung Electronics, and Micron have shifted their attention to developing upcoming HBM4 technology. The facility currently operates at small scale production while it should produce materials to support full manufacturing operations.
The technical core of the project relies on the sixteen nanometer class G4 die, a component that represents the pinnacle of the firm's current manufacturing capability. The engineering team selected this process for die stacking because it creates an efficient method to control die stacking operations. This method requires thermal bonding of memory chips followed by the introduction of liquid epoxy polymer and silica molding material to complete the stacking process. This assembly method remains in use at SK Hynix, but its inability to reach stable operational capacity leads to ongoing scheduling problems.
The industry analysts who study the situation express doubt about the chances of achieving a successful product launch before the year ends. The supply chain lacks production level orders which creates a consensus that mass manufacturing will not begin until the upcoming year. The current stagnation at the company demonstrates how far distance exists between standard memory production and high bandwidth memory architecture development.
