Samsung Electronics set out three directions for AI memory and storage at the OCP Global Summit on 12 October, covering high-performance memory, capacity expansion and SSD-based data management, Yonhap reported on 13 October.
Key points
- Samsung’s proposed technologies span HBM5, CXL memory modules and enterprise SSDs.
- Samsung plans a joint demonstration with AMD using its CMM-D memory module.
- Its preliminary third-quarter estimate puts operating profit at 107.4 trillion won, up 782.5% from a year earlier.
Shim Ho-jun puts HBM5 beside capacity
The summit took place in San Francisco, Yonhap reported. It took place in San Jose, BusinessKorea reported. Shim Ho-jun delivered Samsung’s presentation. Yonhap identified him as corporate vice president and head of the company’s application engineering team. ChosunBiz identified him as executive director of the Memory Business Unit AE Team.
Shim said larger AI models and growing volumes of inference data, including key-value cache data, were increasing the importance of memory capacity and storage alongside bandwidth. He said Samsung was extending co-design and technical validation with customers and partners into earlier stages of development.
For speed, Samsung is preparing HBM5, customised high-bandwidth memory and zHBM, which stacks memory above computing chips. Its processing-in-memory approach places some operations inside the memory device, reducing movement of data between processors and memory.
HBM5 is eighth-generation high-bandwidth memory, three generations beyond the HBM3E used in AI accelerators. Samsung displayed an HBM5 concept model and wafers at the summit. It also showed HBM4E among its memory products for AI accelerators.
AMD and Samsung test CMM-D expansion
Samsung plans a CXL memory-expansion demonstration with AMD that pairs AMD’s computing platform with Samsung’s CMM-D module, ChosunBiz reported. The proposed arrangement is intended to address the limits of memory installed in existing systems.
CXL links processors and memory so systems can expand and share memory resources. Samsung plans to use CMM-D, a module fitted with DRAM, alongside memory pooling that lets multiple computing systems draw on shared capacity as needed.
Samsung and AMD showcased their work on CXL memory expansion at the summit. Samsung is also validating its memory and storage technologies in AI environments and working with technology partners to bring customer requirements into product development.
Enterprise SSDs target persistent AI data
Samsung’s third direction concerns data that must remain available in storage. Its proposed products include enterprise SSDs using quad-level cell NAND and flexible data placement. Quad-level cell technology holds four bits in each NAND cell to increase capacity. Flexible data placement arranges information within an SSD according to its characteristics, with the aim of reducing write operations and improving performance and lifespan.
Samsung is exploring how higher-density SSDs could work with CXL memory expansion to manage key-value cache data during AI inference. Samsung plans to support testing of its memory and storage technologies before commercialisation through Samsung MAX Lab and open-source consortia.
The summit display also extends to Samsung’s foundry business. ChosunBiz reported that the company is exhibiting wafers for Groq’s language processing unit and samples made with Samsung’s 2-nanometre Gate-All-Around process.
Samsung’s 39% DRAM share and profit estimate
Samsung held 39% of the global DRAM market and 29.3% of the NAND flash market in the second quarter of 2026, according to industry research figures reported by BusinessKorea. That market position gives its memory and storage plans an established production business alongside the technologies presented at the summit.
BusinessKorea reported that Samsung’s preliminary forecast on 8 October put operating profit for the third quarter at 107.4 trillion won, with revenue projected at 195 trillion won. An earlier AI Affairs report covered the profit projection as AI memory demand lifted earnings. The estimated operating profit was 782.5% higher than a year earlier.
