Samsung Electronics Chief Technology Officer Song Jai-hyuk speaks to reporters at SEMICON Korea 2026 in southern Seoul, Wednesday. Korea Times photo by Nam Hyun-woo
Samsung Electronics Chief Technology Officer Song Jai-hyuk said Wednesday the company’s high-bandwidth memory 4 (HBM4) chip is showing “good” manufacturing yield, with clients expressing “very satisfied” feedback on the company’s chip.
“We may have fallen short of demonstrating our world-class technological responsiveness to customer needs for a while, but this should be seen as a return to that standard,” Song told reporters before his keynote speech for SEMICON Korea 2026 in Seoul.
Samsung reportedly plans to begin its HBM4 mass production and shipping to major customers later this month. Its HBM4 chips are using its 1c process, the sixth-generation 10-nanometer-class DRAM technology, for the DRAM cell die, while using a 4-nanometer foundry process for the base die.
Based on the technologies, Samsung had its HBM4 chips achieve data processing speeds of up to 11.7 gigabits per second (Gbps), exceeding the Joint Electron Device Engineering Council’s standard of 8 Gbps.
Since they are the industry’s latest technologies, questions have been raised on how the company will secure production yield during the ramping up process, but Song expressed his confidence.
“It is difficult to describe (the yield) in numbers, but I can say the status is very good,” he said, adding that customers are “very satisfied” with the performance of the chip
“In terms of technology, we believe we remain at the top. The question of how we manage our portfolio falls into the realm of business… We believe our in-house capabilities spanning memory, foundry and packaging create the best environment for making artificial intelligence-driven products, and the combination is generating synergy.”
SEMICON Korea, the country’s largest semiconductor industry fair, kicked off its three-day run at Coex in southern Seoul, Wednesday. This year’s edition is the largest of its kind, participated by more than 550 companies in the semiconductor value chain, including Nvidia, Samsung Electronics, SK hynix, Intel, Kioxia, Micron, ASML and Applied Materials. More than 75,000 people have signed up to attend the event, according to SEMI Korea.
Under the theme of Transform Tomorrow, the event featured more than 30 conferences where over 200 experts and other speakers will discuss advanced manufacturing technologies, AI, market trends and other agendas of the industry.
Source: Korea Times News
