China's top memory chip maker YMTC to build 3rd plant, eyeing 2027 start (asia.nikkei.com)

China’s top NAND flash maker, Yangtze Memory Technologies Corp. (YMTC), has begun construction on a third production plant, targeting a 2027 start to expand capacity. The move comes as YMTC seeks to capitalize on surging domestic demand driven by China’s localization push and the AI hardware boom, aiming to grow market share despite being blacklisted by the U.S. The new facility signals a major capacity bet from a company focused on supplying NAND flash — the non-volatile storage used in data centers, servers, edge devices and AI systems. For the AI/ML community, expanded NAND supply could ease storage bottlenecks for large datasets, model checkpoints, and inference caching, supporting faster training and deployment cycles in China and for any customers who source domestically. However, YMTC’s U.S. blacklist remains a technical and strategic constraint: restrictions on advanced tools and equipment could shape the plant’s node roadmap, yield and performance competitiveness versus global rivals. The development underscores how geopolitical dynamics are reshaping memory supply chains and how nations are investing in local semiconductor capacity to support AI infrastructure needs.