A year ago Micron and Intel announced that they would discontinue their collaboration on NAND Flash development after completing the development of the third generation of 3D-NAND Flash. The two companies are currently developing the second generation (64-layer), and the third generation is expected to reach 96-layer.

DRAMeXchange said that Intel and Tsinghua Unigroup had been seen together in all the trendy restaurants, and love is in the air. 

The Chinese market has been a significant focus for Intel, which has been actively seeking different opportunities of cooperation and joint venture for various product lines, including CPU, modem and memory products. Chipzilla has been expanding its production capacity in China, and its fab in Dalian has entered production of 3D-NAND Flash.

Intel and UNIC Memory Technology, the storage business under Tsinghua Unigroup, are now discussing long-term cooperation. Under the agreement, UNIC will be responsible for products testing, packaging and selling based on Intel NAND wafers.

This solution will not only make UNIC more competitive in channel sales but also increase the presence of the brand in the market. Although YMTC and UNIC cannot immediately cut into the middle- and high-end smartphone markets or become competitive in the client SSD sector, their products are likely to be adopted by Chromebooks or other consumer electronics, which may influence the overall prices trend of NAND flash in the future.