Western Digital has successfully developed the fifth generation of 3D NAND technology, BiCS5

     Western Digital Corporation announced that it has successfully developed BiCS5, the fifth generation of 3D NAND technology, continuing to provide the industry with advanced flash memory technology to solidify its industry-leading position. BiCS5 is built on TLC and QLC technologies to deliver increased capacity, performance and reliability at a competitive cost. With the exponential growth of data related to connected cars, mobile devices and artificial intelligence, BiCS5 is the ideal choice.

     Based on the 512 Gb BiCS5 TLC, Western Digital has now successfully achieved mass production in consumer products. Mass production of BiCS5 is expected in the second half of 2020. Western Digital will launch a series of BiCS5 TLC and BiCS5 QLC in optional capacities, including 1.33 Tb.

     Steve Paak, senior vice president of Storage Technology and Manufacturing at Western Digital, said: "As we enter another decade, the new 3D NAND evolution is critical to continue to meet both the growing volume of data and the demand for performance. The successful production of BiCS5 demonstrates Western Digital's continued leadership in flash memory technology and efficient execution of long-term signposts. By leveraging multi-layer storage hole technology to increase storage density and increase the number of layers of storage, we have significantly increased the capacity and performance of 3D NAND to continue to meet the high reliability and low cost that users expect."

     Using a wide range of new technologies and innovative manufacturing processes, BiCS5 is Western Digital's highest density and most advanced 3D NAND to date. Second-generation multilayer memory hole technology, improved manufacturing processes, and other 3D NAND unit enhancements significantly increase the array density of the entire wafer horizontal unit. These "scale-out" technologies, combined with 112-layer vertical storage capabilities, enable BiCS5 to increase storage capacity per wafer by more than 40%* compared to Western Digital's previous generation of 96-layer BiCS4 technology, while optimising costs. The new design improvements also improve performance, with the BiCS5 achieving 50% better I/O performance than the BiCS4.