Latest news with #BiCS8
Forbes
2 days ago
- Business
- Forbes
High-Capacity SSDs Will Enable AI Workloads But Also Drive HDD Demand
At the recent FMS conference in Santa Clara, almost all of the SSD companies were introducing high-capacity SSDs, many over 200TB, with promises for large form factor SSD with 1PB capacities in the future. These SSDs leverage higher logical density, four bit per cell, or QLC flash memory and lots of chips to achieve these capacities. The SanDisk keynote differentiated a couple of different uses for SSDs to support AI workloads. One type are fast eSSDs to support high bandwidth DRAM memory, HBM. The other type are high-capacity storage eSSDs for a higher performance data lake than HDDs can offer. These two types of SSD are shown below. The slide below shows Sandisk's high capacity eSSD. It is a QLC BiCS8 NAND flash U.2 and EDSFF form factor SSDn that is expected to have capacities up to 256TB by 2026. The Sandisk Keynote showed a path to a 512TB version by 2027 and 1PB product sometime in the future. The composite image below shows the Kioxia, Micron and Samsung announcements of their high capacity QLC SSDs. All of the SSD companies are exploring product for near storage AI applications. Many of the higher capacity products are using the E3.S form factor, which can hold more NAND flash chips to enable higher capacities. The Silicon Motion keynote gave an illustration of a traditional representation of the memory and storage hierarchy showing trends for NAND flash supporting GPUs directly, like the HBF announcements by SK hynix and Sandisk at the FMS. It also shows an ultra-high-capacity SSD layer to support warm storage for AI applications. Silicon Motion supplies controllers for SSDs. Higher capacity SSDs can take less rack space than HDDs and they offer higher performance than HDDs offer. This can be an advantage for AI training and inference with RAG, but flash memory is currently about 6X more expensive per storage capacity than HDDs and is expected to remain so, for some time into the future, as shown in the image below from the WDC investor day last February. Seagate shows similar trends. For instance, by 2026 44TB HDDs should be in production, a 38% increase from the largest HDDs available today. This is because the expected storage capacity growth in HDDs has accelerated with the introduction of HAMR HDDs to roughly match the growth in SSD capacities. As a consequence, we consider these larger SSDs will be used for data lakes directly feeding the memory attached to GPUs for AI workflows. However, HDDs will continue to provide lower cost storage for longer term data retention and so these higher capacity SSDs will result in greater growth of HDDs as well. Coughlin Associates has updated its projections for storage capacity shipped for HDDs, SSDs and magnetic tape, shown below. This new projection increases our expectations for growth of SSD storage from prior versions out to 2030 with some reduction in HDD capacity shipments as a consequence. The Coughlin Associates projection for HDD storage capacity prices out to 2030 is shown below. If we assume that SSDs remain at 6X the cost per storage capacity by 2030 and the HDD price per GB of $0.0051 in 2026, the NAND flash price would be about $0.031 per GB. With the projections for shipping capacity of SSDs and HDDs of about 3.0ZB and 10.7ZB, projected revenue for SSDs and HDDs in 2030 is $93B and $55B respectively. The rising storage boat, driven by AI, is expected to result in significant revenue growth for HDDs as well as SSDs. FMS 2025 shows growth of high-capacity SSDs, up to 1PB as well as high-capacity HDDs to support the growth of AI workflows.
Web Release
05-08-2025
- Business
- Web Release
Sandisk Showcases UltraQLCTM Technology Platform with Milestone Enterprise SSD Capacity at FMS 2025
Sandisk today demonstrated a high-capacity 256TB1 NVMeTM enterprise SSD, a breakthrough in storage capacity, performance and power efficiency, made possible by Sandisk's new enterprise-grade UltraQLCTM platform. Offering extraordinary capacity, the UltraQLCTM platform marks a significant achievement in NAND architecture, built with a combination of BiCS8 QLC CBA NAND, custom controllers and advanced system optimizations. As workloads and business requirements evolve in the AI era, flash storage must become more customizable to match complex workloads. The new SANDISK® 256TB1 NVMeTM SSD, built on the UltraQLCTM platform, is designed for AI-driven, data-intensive workloads like data ingest, preparation, and fast AI data lakes with high-performance speeds and power efficiency, while improving TCO for high-capacity applications in hyperscale cloud. 'As we move into the next phase of the AI era, flash storage is becoming a critical enabler of intelligent, high-performance workloads,' said Khurram Ismail, Chief Product Officer at Sandisk. 'Our UltraQLCTM platform is the culmination of years of work and learnings to build a flexible and robust architecture that achieves extraordinary capacities and maximum performance while maintaining efficiency. This enables us to further expand our portfolio to meet AI demands at scale and helps our customers move faster, process more and turn data into real innovation.' The SANDISK® UltraQLCTM 256TB1 NVMeTM SSD sets a new benchmark for hyperscale flash storage, purpose-built for the fast, intelligent data lakes powering AI at scale. With lower latency, higher bandwidth, and greater reliability, it delivers the performance needed for today's most demanding AI workloads. Key innovations include: Direct Write QLC, which eliminates SLC buffering by enabling power-loss safe writes on the first pass BiCS8 2Tb QLC die that doubles storage density while maintaining compact die sizes UltraQLC TM power optimization, which uses Dynamic Frequency Scaling for up to 10% higher performance for a given power level 2 (projected) power optimization, which uses Dynamic Frequency Scaling for up to 10% higher performance for a given power level (projected) Scalable multi-core controller that helps ensure high throughput and endurance at extreme capacities Data Retention (DR) profile that reduces DR recycles by up to 33 percent3 (projected), improving drive reliability, resilience and continuous access to data while decreasing power consumption The SANDISK® SN670 128TB1 NVMeTM SSD and SANDISK® UltraQLCTM 256TB1 NVMeTM SSD will be available in U.2 form factor in the first half of 2026, with additional form factors available later in the year. Sandisk will host a keynote at FMS 2025 on Wednesday, August 6, at 11:40 AM, to highlight its UltraQLCTM platform and will demo its milestone 256TB1 NVMeTM SSD, alongside additional innovative storage solutions, at FMS Booth #607. Blog: Inside UltraQLC: The Enterprise SSD Platform Engineered for AI For more information about Sandisk, please visit:
Yahoo
26-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Sandisk Corporation (SNDK): A Bull Case Theory
We came across a bullish thesis on Sandisk Corporation (SNDK) on wallstreetbets subreddit by b0men. In this article, we will summarize the bulls' thesis on SNDK. Sandisk Corporation (SNDK)'s share was trading at $42.5 as of 13th June. A data centre room with cloud technology, illustrating the enterprise application software services. Sandisk, now operating independently following its separation from Western Digital, is quietly carving out a powerful niche in the AI infrastructure arms race. Its Gen5 enterprise SSDs were recently certified by NVIDIA for datacenter use, officially embedding the company into the AI server vendor chain. The standout innovation is Sandisk's proprietary High Bandwidth Flash (HBF) architecture—developed fully in-house—designed for massive capacity and throughput, tailored specifically for AI workloads. This positions Sandisk as a one-of-a-kind supplier with differentiated technology. Complementing this, the company is shipping BiCS8, one of the most power-efficient flash technologies currently available. Cloud hyperscaler traction is rising rapidly: 12% of total output went to AWS, GCP, and Azure this quarter, up from 8% a year ago, reflecting intensifying AI-related spend. This growth appears sustainable, as internal reports from major tech companies show transformative AI deployment efforts already yielding dramatic productivity gains. While the company still has a consumer-facing segment, its real upside lies in enterprise AI, where it's now gaining relevance in billion-dollar deal cycles. Financially, Sandisk posted $1.7B in revenue and $220M in adjusted free cash flow this quarter, with $1.5B in cash on hand. Despite soft gross margins (22.7%) due to pricing and NAND volatility, management is focused on restoring profitability. The company is also making moves in gaming, EVs, and content creation, expanding its flash technology footprint. Risks remain, including thin options liquidity and lingering consumer weakness, but with unique AI-aligned assets and accelerating cloud demand, Sandisk offers asymmetric upside. For now, it's a high-risk bet with potentially transformative payoff. Previously, we covered a on Intel (INTC) by Jellym9s on wallstreetbets in December 2024, framing it as a turnaround bet anchored by its Foundry Services and geopolitical tailwinds favoring domestic chip production. The thesis outlined a potential strategic pivot away from lagging product segments toward becoming the U.S. equivalent of TSMC. The thesis on Sandisk (SNDK) by b0men extends this theme of U.S.-based semiconductor resurgence, but through the lens of AI infrastructure. Sandisk's proprietary enterprise SSD technology and early traction with hyperscalers signal a niche, high-performance role in AI datacenters, offering complementary upside to Intel's foundry ambitions. Sandisk Corporation (SNDK) is not on our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 44 hedge fund portfolios held Sandisk Corporation (SNDK) at the end of the first quarter which was 0 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the risk and potential of SNDK as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and have limited downside risk. If you are looking for an extremely cheap AI stock that is also a major beneficiary of Trump tariffs and onshoring, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock. READ NEXT: 8 Best Wide Moat Stocks to Buy Now and 30 Most Important AI Stocks According to BlackRock. Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
