SK Hynix invests more than 20 trillion won… HBM production base to be built in Cheongju

SK Hynix is ​​resuming construction of its new plant in Cheongju, North Chungcheong Province, which had been temporarily suspended. This factory, which will be completed next year, is scheduled to produce high bandwidth memory (HBM). It appears that the memory market, including DRAM, which was in a recession for a while, has entered a complete recovery in line with the artificial intelligence (AI) craze.

SK Hynix held a board meeting on the 24th and decided to invest approximately 5.3 trillion won in the new fab (semiconductor factory) ‘M15X’ to be built in Cheongju as a DRAM production base. SK Hynix plans to begin construction at the end of this month and begin mass production after completion in November next year. The plan is to invest in equipment sequentially and invest a total of more than 20 trillion won in the M15X in the long term.

It has been one year since construction of the new Cheongju factory resumed. Previously, SK Hynix announced that it would begin construction of M15X in Cheongju Technopolis Industrial Complex in 2022, but stopped construction in April last year as the memory market froze sharply due to a decline in information technology (IT) demand.

However, as memory prices, including DRAM, began to rebound since the end of last year, the new factory project, which had been postponed, was started again. It was not decided which semiconductor would be produced in M15X, DRAM or NAND flash, but this time it was decided to use the DRAM line.

SK Hynix said, “We believe that the DRAM market has entered a mid- to long-term growth phase as the AI ​​era is in full swing,” adding, “We are focusing on high-capacity double date rate (DDR) 5 module products for servers along with HBM, which is expected to grow at an average annual growth rate of more than 60%.” “As a result, demand for general DRAM will continue to increase.”

HBM, which bundles several DRAMs, is considered a high value-added product mounted on Nvidia’s AI chips. SK Hynix explained the background to this decision, saying, “HBM determined that increasing DRAM capacity is a prerequisite as at least twice the capacity is required to secure the same production volume as regular DRAM products.” .

SK Hynix is ​​also pursuing the ‘Yongin Semiconductor Cluster’ project in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, investing more than 120 trillion won. The Yongin cluster site construction progress rate is approximately 26%, and construction is progressing faster than the existing target. Yongin’s first semiconductor plant will begin construction in March next year and be completed in 2027.

Kwak No-jeong, CEO of SK Hynix, said, “M15X will become a core facility that supplies AI memory around the world and become a stepping stone between the company’s present and future.”