March 19, 2026 -
Memory makers big and small are innovating storage solutions to meet the mounting needs of AI, industrial factories, software-defined vehicles, and space exploration.
By Joshua Tidwell, allaboutcircuits.com
Memory technology is being pushed in very different directions. In some cases, it’s about raw bandwidth and thermal limits, while in others, it’s long-term availability, functional safety, or radiation immunity.
Over the last few weeks, four announcements highlighted how specialized the memory market has become. Samsung began mass production of its HBM4; Intelligent Memory introduced new low-density industrial eMMC devices; SK Hynix secured ASIL-D certification for automotive LPDDR5X; and Avalanche Technology announced the deployment of its space-grade MRAM on unmanned rovers and deep-space exploration.
Samsung HBM4 Raises the Bandwidth Ceiling for AI
Samsung has begun mass-producing its 12-layer HBM4, delivering a consistent transfer speed of 11.7 Gbps with headroom for up to 13 Gbps. That represents roughly a 46% improvement over the 8 Gbps industry baseline and a 1.22× increase over its HBM3E predecessor. Total memory bandwidth per stack reaches up to 3.3 TB/s, a 2.7× increase compared to HBM3E, directly addressing data bottlenecks that emerge as AI models scale.