“With our production of the first 2.4Gbps 8GB HBM2, we are further strengthening our technology leadership and market competitiveness,” said Jaesoo Han, executive vice president, Memory Sales & Marketing team at Samsung Electronics. “We will continue to reinforce our command of the DRAM market by assuring a stable supply of HBM2 worldwide, in accordance with the timing of anticipated next-generation system launches by our customers.”

Samsung’s new 8GB HBM2 delivers the highest level of DRAM performance, featuring a 2.4Gbps pin speed at 1.2V, which translates into a performance upgrade of nearly 50 percent per each package, compared to the company’s 1st-generation 8GB HBM2 package with its 1.6Gbps pin speed at 1.2V and 2.0Gbps at 1.35V.

With these improvements, a single Samsung 8GB HBM2 package will offer a 307 gigabytes-per-second (GBps) data bandwidth, achieving 9.6 times faster data transmission than an 8 gigabit (Gb) GDDR5 chip, which provides a 32GBps data bandwidth.* Using four of the new HBM2 packages in a system will enable a 1.2 terabytes-per-second (TBps) bandwidth., which will improve overall system performance by as much as 50 percent, compared to a system that uses a 1.6Gbps HBM2.

Samsung’s new Aquabolt significantly extends the company’s leadership in driving the growth of the premium DRAM market. Moreover, Samsung will continue to offer leading-edge HBM2 solutions, to succeed its 1st-generation HBM2, Flarebolt, and its 2nd-generation, Aquabolt, as it further expands the market over the next several years.

To achieve Aquabolt’s unprecedented performance, Samsung has applied new technologies related to TSV design and thermal control. A single 8GB HBM2 package consists of eight 8Gb HBM2 dies, which are vertically interconnected using over 5,000 TSVs (Through Silicon Via’s) per die. While using so many TSVs can cause collateral clock skew, Samsung succeeded in minimizing the skew to a very modest level and significantly enhancing chip performance in the process.

In addition, Samsung increased the number of thermal bumps between the HBM2 dies, which enables stronger thermal control in each package. Also, the new HBM2 includes an additional protective layer at the bottom, which increases the package’s overall physical strength.

In accommodating the growing need for high-performance HBM2 DRAM, Samsung will supply Aquabolt to its global IT customers at a stable pace, and continue to rapidly advance its memory technology in conjunction with leading OEMs throughout a wide array of fields including supercomputing, artificial intelligence, and graphics processing.

* Editor’s Note:

[HBM2 and GDDR5 data bandwidth calculation]

-An 8GB HBM2 package’s data bandwidth: 2.4Gbps per pin x 1024bit bus = 307.2GBps

Using four HBM2 packages in a system: 307.2GBps x 4 = 1228.8GBps = approximately 1.2TBps

-A 8Gb GDDR5 die’s data bandwidth: 8Gbps per pin x 32bit bus = 32GBps

Note: All brand, product, service names and logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of their respective owners and are hereby recognized and acknowledged. Aquabolt and Flarebolt are trademarks of Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

Samsung Electronics, the world leader in advanced memory technology, today announced that it is increasing the production volume of its 8-gigabyte (GB) High Bandwidth Memory-2 (HBM2) to meet growing market needs across a wide range of applications including artificial intelligence, HPC (high-performance computing), advanced graphics, network systems and enterprise servers.

“By increasing production of the industry’s only 8GB HBM2 solution now available, we are aiming to ensure that global IT system manufacturers have sufficient supply for timely development of new and upgraded systems,” said Jaesoo Han, executive vice president, Memory Sales & Marketing team at Samsung Electronics. “We will continue to deliver more advanced HBM2 line-ups, while closely cooperating with our global IT customers.”

Samsung’s 8GB HBM2 delivers the highest level of HBM2 performance, reliability and energy efficiency in the industry, underscoring the company’s commitment to DRAM innovation. Among the HBM2 and TSV (Through Silicon Via) technologies that were utilized for the latest DRAM solution, more than 850 of them have been submitted for patents or already patented.

The 8GB HBM2 consists of eight 8-gigabit (Gb) HBM2 dies and a buffer die at the bottom of the stack, which are all vertically interconnected by TSVs and microbumps. With each die containing over 5,000 TSVs, a single Samsung 8GB HBM2 package has over 40,000 TSVs. The utilization of so many TSVs, including spares, ensures high performance, by enabling data paths to be switched to different TSVs when a delay in data transmission occurs. The HBM2 is also designed to prevent overheating beyond certain temperature to guarantee high reliability.

First introduced in June 2016, the HBM2 boasts a 256GB/s data transmission bandwidth, offering more than an eight-fold increase over a 32GB/s GDDR5 DRAM chip. With capacity double that of 4GB HBM2, the 8GB solution contributes greatly to improving system performance and energy efficiency, offering ideal upgrades to data-intensive, high-end computing applications that deal with machine learning, parallel computing and graphics rendering.

In meeting increasing market demand, Samsung anticipates that its volume production of the 8GB HBM2 will cover more than 50 percent of its HBM2 production by the first half of next year.