Troubled Chipzilla wants to cash in on the DRAM frenzy by teaming up with a SoftBank subsidiary to push a new “ZAM” memory technology.
With AI infrastructure buildouts running hot this year, DRAM demand has surged as hyperscalers and chipmakers hoover up supply. Memory suppliers are limited worldwide, bottlenecks are ugly, and the industry is desperate for anyone with a credible new angle, which is why Intel is reportedly flirting with a return to the memory game.
The claim is that Chipzilla will work with SoftBank’s Saimemory on a new standard called Z-Angle Memory, or ZAM. Work on the technology is said to have started under the Advanced Memory Technology programme kicked off by the US Department of Energy, where Chipzilla showed off “next-generation” DRAM bonding.
SoftBank’s release does not spell out where Z-Angle Memory sits in the product stack, but the underlying idea looks familiar. Based on what has been reported about Chipzilla’s bonding work, ZAM would likely use a staggered interconnect layout routing links diagonally inside the die stack rather than drilling straight down.
Chipzilla officials said: “Standard memory architectures cannot meet the needs of artificial intelligence. NGDB defines a novel approach that will accelerate our progress into the next decade. We are rethinking how DRAM is organised to fundamentally advance computer system architecture, aiming to achieve orders-of-magnitude performance improvements and incorporate innovation into industry standards.”
With the “Z-Angle” approach, Chipzilla would aim to use more silicon area for memory cells, thereby achieving higher densities and reducing thermal resistance. The bonding could involve copper-to-copper hybrid bonding to fuse layers more efficiently, building something closer to a monolithic silicon block than a set of separate stacks.
The chatter also says ZAM will be capacitor-less, with Chipzilla’s EMIB used to connect the memory to an AI chip. That is the sort of packaging flourish Chipzilla loves talking about when it is trying to sound inevitable.
For SoftBank, the partnership is an opportunity to gain control of the memory stack and potentially integrate it with its own custom ASIC work, including the Izanagi lineup mentioned in the reporting. That would give it tighter control of layout choices and system design, assuming the tech performs outside press releases.
The numbers being proposed are ambitious, even if they are not yet firmly established. The pitch is that ZAM achieves 40-50 per cent lower power consumption, simplifies manufacturing via Z-angle interconnects, and increases storage per chip to 512GB.
Chipzilla has played the DRAM game before, running a dedicated business until it bailed out in 1985 after losing share to Japanese rivals. Memory is now fashionable again because AI has made bandwidth and capacity everyone’s problem, and the real test will be whether Chipzilla can persuade big players to bet on it instead of sticking with established HBM roadmaps.
