Recently, SK Hynix and Intel jointly announced the signing of an acquisition agreement. SK Hynix will acquire Intel's NAND flash memory and storage business for US$9 billion, including Intel's NAND SSD business, NAND component and wafer business, and its NAND business in Dalian, China. Flash memory manufacturing plant.
Intel will keep the Intel OptaneTM (OptaneTM) business and plans to invest in key businesses with long-term growth potential by the funds obtained from this transaction, including AI, 5G networks, and edge devices related to smart and autonomous driving.
In March this year, at the financial report meeting, Intel’s Chief Financial Officer George Davis said that although 5G and cloud computing have promoted the continued growth of NAND flash memory, Intel “cannot achieve expected profit”.
With the surge in data storage, the NAND device market is expected to stay strong in the next few years. After the acquisition of Intel’s flash memory business, the concentration of the NAND industry has further improved. SK Hynix's NAND flash memory market share will exceed 20%, surpassing Japan's Kioxia (formerly known as Toshiba Storage) ,which cause it become the world's second largest NAND flash memory manufacturer after Samsung.