South Korean semiconductor giant SK Hynix is planning to use its technological advantages to counterattack its competitor Changxin Memory (CXMT) in order to shorten the latter's "golden period" of development. According to Korean media Herald Corp, SK Hynix plans to officially launch mass production and shipment of next-generation LPDDR6 mobile memory in the second half of 2026, and one of its first customers is from a local Chinese brand.
The news pointed out that Xiaomi will become the first customer of SK Hynix’s sixth-generation 10-nanometer (1c) LPDDR6 memory. This node technology not only greatly improves the data transmission rate, but also has a significant breakthrough in energy efficiency compared with the previous generation standard. In addition to the smartphone field, SK Hynix is also targeting the AI server market and plans to launch SOCAMM LPDDR6 memory with a capacity of up to 512GB per module to meet the strong demand for low power consumption, high bandwidth and easy heat dissipation of agent-type artificial intelligence (Agentic AI).
On the other hand, Changxin Memory is currently actively preparing for production capacity transformation to promote the stable mass production of DDR6 memory, but it will still take several years before this stage officially arrives. This technology generation gap created a critical market window period for SK Hynix, allowing it to take the lead in seizing the market share of Chinese mobile phone manufacturers. The report analyzed that after Xiaomi takes the lead in adopting it, local Chinese brands such as OPPO and vivo are also expected to follow up and cooperate. There are previous rumors that even though Huawei occupies the majority of shipments in the Chinese mobile phone market and a large number of memory orders, it still faces certain challenges on the supply side. This may prompt manufacturers such as Xiaomi, OPPO and vivo to choose to lock in long-term and stable production capacity supply with overseas memory leaders in advance to avoid potential supply chain risks.
Although SK Hynix is not expected to provide additional low-price discounts to Chinese mobile phone brands, the cooperation between the two parties will ensure that Chinese manufacturers receive timely delivery of memory components and alleviate concerns about supply chain interruptions. At the same time, by fully promoting LPDDR6 to the AI data center field, SK Hynix is further consolidating its dominant position in the global next-generation storage standard.