Japanese chipmaker Kioxia has started shipping next-generation NAND memory samples, as rising AI-driven demand strengthens its market position and accelerates expansion plans.
Japanese semiconductor company Kioxia has begun shipping samples of its next-generation NAND flash memory, marking a major milestone in its recovery amid increasing AI-driven demand for high-capacity memory solutions.
According to Reuters, Kioxia held a ceremony at its fabrication plant in Kitakami, northern Japan, as it started sample shipments of its 10th-generation BiCS Flash memory, developed in partnership with SanDisk.
The AI boom has significantly improved Kioxia’s fortunes, with its market capitalisation crossing 250 billion dollars, surpassing Toyota Motor. The company’s stock has risen sharply this year, although recent trading has remained volatile due to concerns over AI spending and capacity expansion.
As AI workloads shift from model training to inference, demand for high-capacity NAND memory has grown rapidly.
Satoru Oyama, consultant and former Tokyo Electron executive, said, “Chipmakers prioritised DRAM so much that NAND investment and development moved to the back burner.”
Kioxia CEO Hiroo Ota said the company plans to widen production at Fab2 to meet growing market demand. Japan is also pushing to rebuild its semiconductor industry, targeting a fivefold increase in domestically produced chip sales by 2040.
