Samsung to use Chinese rival YMTC's patents for new storage chips

Samsung could lease hybrid bonding patents from YMTC for V10 NAND flash storage chips

According to a report from ZDNet Korea, Samsung has decided to lease hybrid bonding patents from the Chinese firm YMTC for its next-generation storage chips. YMTC is the first company to use hybrid bonding, an advanced chip packaging technology essential in manufacturing V10 NAND flash storage chips.

Samsung has been using a technology called Cell-On-Periphery (COP) to stack cells in its previous and current-generation NAND flash chips. However, with each new generation, as more cells are stacked on top of the wafer, the pressure on the lower ferries increases, reducing the chip's reliability.

In comparison, YMTC's hybrid bonding technology omits the bumps required in conventional chips, thereby reducing the electrical path and improving heat dissipation. This results in improved overall performance. In particular, YMTC uses W2W, a hybrid bonding technology that directly bonds wafers to wafers instead of cells.

YMTC started using it four years ago and acquired more patents related to this technology from the US-based firm Xperi.

Instead of fighting with YMTC regarding hybrid bonding patents necessary to make V10, V11, and V12 NAND flash chips, Samsung reportedly thought it would be better to lease YMTC's patents and move the technology forward. It isn't clear if Samsung also held talks with Xperi.

Samsung's biggest rival, SK Hynix, is also expected to sign a patent lease deal with YMTC for the same hybrid bonding technologies for 400-layer NAND flash chips.