Development of World`s First 70 Nano 4G-Memory

Samsung Electronics has developed the 4-giga flash memory with 70nm(nanometer •1nm is one billionth of a meter) micro processing technology for the first time in the world.

70nm technology is a minimum width semiconductor technology that surpasses the boundaries of the existing 90nm technology. Its memory capacity of 4-giga is the world`s largest memory capacity for a NAND flash memory.

President Hwang Chang-gyu of Samsung Electronics` Memory Business Branch announced at the Memory Business Strategy Presentation that, ˝We are opening the full-fledged `Nano-semiconductor Era` by developing 70nm flash memory that is the most advanced out of all the existing DRAM, flash memory and etc.˝

The newly developed 4-giga NAND form flash memory is more advanced that its Japanese competitor Toshiba`s product by about 9 months.

Samsung Electronics made great achievements of increasing memory integration degree by 2 folds every year for 4 consecutive years since 1999 by developing a product with 2 folds of memory capacity in just a year after developing a 2-giga product in last Sep.

The width of a circuit inside the memory chip is just about one fourteenth of the thickness of a string of hair. Therefore it allows greater memory capacity with the same sized memory chip. It has double memory integration than existing 90nm products, thus allowing 2000 MP3 music files and 8 hrs of digital images in an 8-gigabite module.

Samsung Electronics expects that productivity rate will go up by 50% compared to the existing 90nm procedures when 70nm memory products are mass-produced in late next year.

Samsung Electronics announced that it has also secured 80nm grade 512 mega DRAM mass-production technology by using its own 3-dimensional transistor technology, and will market new-concept `fusion memory chip` that has combined benefits of NAND form and NOR form flash memories.

Tae-Han Kim Jin-Suk Huh freewill@donga.com jameshuh@donga.com