[Exclusive] Kim Juseon, SK Hynix President: "Watching HBM3E 16-layer... Competition Will Heat Up"

SK Hynix has completed the development of the next-generation high-performance memory HBM 3E 16-layer and expressed confidence in securing market leadership.

On the 20th (local time), Kim Joo-sun, Head of AI Infrastructure at SK Hynix, met with Asia Economy at the annual developer conference 'GTC 2025' held in San Jose, California, USA, and said, "We have developed the HBM3E 16-layer and are waiting for customers' choice."

Kim explained, "We made it about a year ago and told customers to take it, but there is a trend where the price increases as the bandwidth increases." This is interpreted to mean that SK Hynix holds an advantage in the HBM3E market and has negotiation leadership.

He added, "The entire industry is watching each other," and said, "The priority has become 12 layers, and probably others are the same." He also said, "Once the 16-layer competition starts soon, everyone will use 16 layers."

Kim Juseon, President of AI Infrastructure at SK Hynix. Photo by Yonhap News

NVIDIA is also considered one of SK Hynix's major customers, and if a deal with NVIDIA is made in the future, SK Hynix's influence in the HBM market is expected to expand further.

Kim revealed that he had a meeting with Jeff Fisher, Senior Vice President of NVIDIA's GPU business division, the day before. On the 18th, Vice President Fisher visited the SK Hynix booth and left a handwritten signature and congratulatory message on the HBM4 sample explanation materials. Accordingly, it is expected that SK Hynix's HBM4 will likely be equipped in NVIDIA's next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) semiconductor 'Rubin,' which was unveiled for the first time at this year's GTC.

Domestic competitor Samsung Electronics is also fighting fiercely for memory leadership. On the same day, Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, after finishing the 'Quantum Day' panel discussion in the morning, toured corporate booths in the afternoon. He visited the Samsung Electronics booth and, surrounded by attendees, left a handwritten signature and note on Samsung's GDDR7, which is installed in NVIDIA products. CEO Huang wrote with a golden pen he brought himself, "Samsung RTX On (ray tracing technology applied), GDDR7 Rocks (the best)!"

It is known that Samsung Electronics' GDDR7 was installed in the RTX50 series earlier, but this is the first time Samsung Electronics has exhibited it externally at this GTC. Recently, the industry has been forecasting that Samsung Electronics will supply improved HBM3E products to major customers including NVIDIA from the end of this month, and NVIDIA is also interpreted to have sent a positive signal.

On the 20th (local time), the SK Hynix HBM4 12-layer model exhibited at 'GTC 2025' held in San Jose, USA. Photo by Junyi Park