Kioxia Uses AWS for Better HPC Performance and Cost Savings in Semiconductor Memory Development and Manufacturing

Kioxia creates flash memory and SSD products to “uplift the world with memory.” The company’s plant in Yokkaichi city, Japan, is one of the largest and most productive in the industry. Famous as a smart factory that leverages AI and other advanced technology, the Yokkaichi plant has proudly delivered unrivaled productivity and efficiency for 30 years. “The semiconductor memory industry is fiercely competitive, so we challenge ourselves and maintain the momentum of a young venture company,” says Toshiaki Kawabata, Chief Information and Security Officer and executive at Kioxia Holdings.

“The semiconductor market has experienced rapid technological innovations and massive waves of change,” Kawabata continues. “We created the world's first NAND flash memory in 1987 under Toshiba, and in 2007, we were the first to announce 3D multilayer technology. Wherever we see a benefit, we strive to create through a bottom-up approach using systems that leverage advanced IT.”

This approach includes the cloud as the company embraces new technology with a forward-thinking attitude. “We also rigorously scrutinize security,” says Kawabata, emphasizing the importance of security measures.

IT is as essential for designing and manufacturing semiconductor memory as it is in other manufacturing industries. Computing power is especially essential in engineering, such as memory design and simulations. Due to the intricate design of semiconductor memory and the complex manufacturing process, Kioxia uses IT to save on labor and improve yields at every stage of the process.

Basic engineering requires massive HPC computing power to correctly simulate running circuit designs or to replicate the manufacturing process to predict problems. HPC power is especially important for designing manufacturing components called photomasks.

To manufacture semiconductor memory, photomask patterns are transferred to semiconductor wafers by shining ultraviolet light at ultra-high speeds, akin to developing photographs. Photomasks correct the original circuit design and enable accurate manufacturing, producing circuits of several nanometers (nm) that are thinner than the wavelength of UV light (approx. 300 nm). This design requires iterative simulations with the computational power of HPC.

Kioxia has a colossal on-premises HPC environment to meet a variety of computational needs. Through its many years of experience, the company has accumulated the knowledge to bolster resources to perfectly match market and technological needs. Despite this expertise, Kioxia still had difficulty preempting short-term peaks and problems by resourcing for them.

“We planned well, prepared resources, and distributed them appropriately, but external factors still caused a few events per year where we had to pause projects or find another solution,” says Masanori Takahashi, Chief Specialist of Memory Lithography, Kioxia. “We use HPC to replace human capabilities, reducing their workload and optimizing costs. However, when resources are in short supply, our workers must respond using their own knowledge, which increases labor costs.”

Kioxia turned to cloud services to solve the challenge. When the company spun off from Toshiba, it began researching many cloud solutions, focusing on AWS, which was already a popular key service. AWS’s components and APIs are similar to Solaris and UNIX, which have long been popular as semiconductor memory development environments. Takahashi decided the company’s experienced engineers would find AWS familiar, allowing them to leverage their knowledge.