Micron Technology today introduced the industry's densest 128Gbit NAND flash memory device utilizing its 20-nanometer (nm) process technology and packing three bits of data per cell into the chip.
Three-bit flash technology is referred to as triple-level-cell (TLC), a highly compact storage medium compared with far more common, two-bit, multi-level cell (MLC) NAND flash. The most expensive, highest performance and longest lasting NAND flash is single-level cell (SLC) flash.
A 20nm NAND flash die.
Micron's new chip measures 12mm x 12mm, and it is more than 25% smaller than the same capacity of Micron's 20nm multi-level-cell (MLC) NAND device. The 128Gb TLC device is targeted at the low-cost removable storage market (flash cards and USB drives), which is projected to consume 35% of total NAND gigabytes in calendar 2013, according to research firms.
Micron is now sampling the 128Gb TLC NAND device with select customers; it will be in production in second quarter of calendar 2013.
"This is the industry's smallest, highest-capacity NAND flash memory device, empowering a new class of consumer storage applications," said Glen Hawk, vice president of Micron's NAND Solutions Group.
Micron is presenting a paper on the 128Gbit TLC NAND device at the upcoming International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) on Feb. 19 in San Francisco.
