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takyon writes:

GlobalFoundries Teams Up with Singapore University for ReRAM Project

GlobalFoundries has announced that the company has teamed up with Singapore's Nanyang Technological University and the National Research Foundation to develop resistive random access memory (ReRAM). The next-generation memory technology could ultimately pave the way for use as a very fast non-volatile high-capacity embedded cache. The project will take four years and will cost S$120 million ($88 million).

[...] Right now, GlobalFoundries (and other contract makers of semiconductors) use eFlash (embedded flash) for chips that need relatively high-capacity onboard storage. This technology has numerous limitations, such as endurance and performance when manufactured using today's advanced logic technologies (i.e., sub-20nm nodes), which is something that is required of embedded memories. This is the main reason why GlobalFoundries and other chipmakers are looking at magneto resistive RAM (MRAM) to replace eFlash in future designs as it is considered the most durable non-volatile memory technology that exists today that can be made using contemporary logic fabrication processes.

MRAM relies on reading the magnetic anisotropy (orientation) of two ferromagnetic films separated by a thin barrier, and thus does not require an erase cycle before writing data, which makes it substantially faster than eFlash. Furthermore, its writing process requires a considerably lower amount of energy. On the flip side, MRAM's density is relatively low, its magnetic anisotropy decreases [open, DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-32641-6] [DX] at low temperatures, which makes it a no-option for numerous applications, but which is still very promising for the majority of use cases that do not involve low temperatures.

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