Samsung Electronics recently presented a number of memory strategies to prepare for the “AI Big Bang” era at the Investors Forum 2023 in Hong Kong.
The company aims to dominate the automotive memory market by 2025, with plans to roll out AI-related products starting next year. The AI market is expanding from cloud servers to on-device technologies in smartphones and PCs. Samsung Electronics plans to meet the demand for the upcoming autonomous driving era with a range of solutions.
According to industry sources on Nov. 22, Samsung Electronics introduced these strategies at the Investors Forum 2023 in Hong Kong, highlighting its proactive response to the impending automotive AI era. The automotive system semiconductor market, currently at US$50 billion, represents only 4% of the total US$1.34 trillion market. However, it is projected to grow at an average annual rate of 17% over the next five years (2023-2028), outpacing the mobile (6%) and high-performance computing (12%) sectors.
The growth in the automotive sector is expected to accelerate with advancements in autonomous driving technology. Autonomous driving levels, classified from levels 0 to 5 by the Society of Automotive Engineers, are currently at “level 3,” or conditional automation, which still requires human intervention. But as the technology progresses to levels 4 and 5, AI capabilities are anticipated to advance significantly. The number of sensors in vehicles is expected to increase from around 15 to 25-30, and AI computing performance could surge from 24 trillion operations per second (TOPS) to between 320-1000 TOPS. This is why the memory industry is focusing on “on-device AI,” so AI can be anywhere at any time without the need for network connectivity.
Samsung Electronics announced that it is developing various automotive memories to meet future demands in the industry. The company will release a new “561-ball package” Low Power Double Data Rate 5X (LPDDR5X) automotive memory module in the first half of next year. This new memory is half the size of the previous generation (441-ball package) but offers 20% greater power efficiency. It utilizes a higher-density flip-chip ball grid array (FC-BGA) substrate. Despite its smaller size, it can process data at a speed of 68 GB per second, equivalent to handling 13 full-HD movies in one second.
Additionally, Samsung Electronics plans to release a detachable Auto Solid State Drive (SSD) next year. This product increases data efficiency by enabling storage virtualization, allowing a single SSD to be partitioned for use by multiple Systems-on-Chip (SoCs). It supports a maximum continuous read speed of 6500 MB/s and offers a capacity of 4 TB. The detachable design facilitates easy SSD replacement, making performance upgrades convenient.
In 2025, Samsung Electronics also plans to release the GDDR7 high-speed Graphic DRAM, capable of 32 Gbps. This product, developed by Samsung Electronics this year, allows for the transfer of large data volumes at 128 GB/s and is suitable for applications such as autonomous vehicles. It also supports ultra-low-voltage options to match the requirements of its applications.
Samsung Electronics aims to launch its automotive GDDR7 by 2025, coinciding with the expected commercialization of level 4 high autonomous driving, and plans to become a leader in the automotive semiconductor industry by then. The company aspires to lead the era of complete autonomous driving (level 5) by 2030.