SK Hynix has just announced its next-gen 12-Hi HBM3e & SOCAMM memory alongside the sampling of the world's first 12-Hi HBM4 samples.
SK Hynix Begins Sampling Next-Gen 12-High HBM4 Memory Alongside HBM3E Memory That Powers NVIDIA's Latest GB300 AI Chip, SOCAMM Is Also Ready
SK Hynix has been moving forward rapidly with its innovative memory products for the industry's leading computing hardware, such as high-performance data center GPUs. It has announced that it will unveil its leading 12-high HBM3E and the SOCAMM memories at the GTC 2025 event, which is currently being held from 17th to 21st March in Jose, California.
The company has been a fierce competitor to Samsung and Micron and has manufactured the latest SOCAMM (Small Outline Compression Attached Memory Module) for NVIDIA's powerful AI chips. This is based on the popular CAMM memory, which is used on NVIDIA's chips but will be a low-power DRAM.
SK Hynix SOCAMM memory will help bump up the memory capacity drastically, increasing the performance in AI workloads while remaining power-efficient. Apart from SOCAMM, SK Hynix will also showcase its 12-High HBM3E memory that it supplied to NVIDIA for manufacturing the latest Blackwell GB300 GPUs. SK Hynix exclusively made a deal with NVIDIA for the GB300 AI chip and has a strong lead against its competitors already.
SK Hynix had already mass-produced 12H HBM3E in September last year, while Samsung will roughly need several more months to catch up to SK Hynix. SK Hynix's top executives will showcase the products at the GTC event and will include personalities like CEO Kwak Noh-Jung, President & Head of AI Infra CMO Juseon Kim, and Head of Global S&M, Lee Sangrak.
The samples were delivered ahead of schedule based on SK hynix’s technological edge and production experience that have led the HBM market, and the company is to start the certification process for the customers. SK hynix aims to complete preparations for mass production of 12-layer HBM4 products within the second half of the year, strengthening its position in the next-generation AI memory market.
The 12-layer HBM4 provided as samples this time feature the industry’s best capacity and speed which are essential for AI memory products.
The product has implemented bandwidth1 capable of processing more than 2TB (terabytes) of data per second for the first time. This translates to processing data equivalent to more than 400 full-HD movies (5GB each) in a second, which is more than 60 percent faster than the previous generation, HBM3E.
SK hynix also adopted the Advanced MR-MUF process to achieve the capacity of 36GB, which is the highest among 12-layer HBM products. The process, of which competitiveness has been proved through a successful production of the previous generation, helps prevent chip warpage, while maximizing product stability by improving heat dissipation.
via SK Hynix
Finally, the company will also showcase its leading 12-high HBM4 memory, which is currently under development and is being sampled to leading customers, including NVIDIA, who will be using it on the Rubin series of GPUs. The 12-Hi HBM4 memory brings up to 36 GB capacity per stack and also features data rates of up to 2 TB/s.
The company is set to mass-produce the 12-H HBM4 memory in the second half of 2025 and will utilize TSMC's 3nm process node.
