NOR flash is an alternative to EEPROM in many applications due to its programmable capabilities, and is finding new opportunities in applications that require fast, non-volatile memory (NVM), including communications, industrial and automotive. Under the rapid development of autonomous vehicles, NOR flash is more concerned about business opportunities in the automotive field.
Macronix International, which is one of the leading suppliers of the NOR flash market, recently announced that it has ranked third in the automotive market. Anthony Le, senior director of the marketing department of Wanghong Electronics Market, understands that the company I am confident that I will further lead the automotive NOR flash market in the next two to three years.
Le said that his career is in line with the development of NOR flash. From the first technical project in the mid-1990s, NOR flash has evolved to withstand the high temperatures required by vehicles. Today, Le said. The heat resistance of NOR flash and the data retention time of up to 20 years will help Wanghong to position itself in a favorable position to make extensive use of all vehicle opportunities.
Le said that NOR flash originally started with radio (this is an application that doesn't require much memory in the automotive field. But in the past decade, telecomtics in the central console and all the features And features have increased the need for memory. Today, cars without digital displays should be bought by no one. He said that today's car dashboards are loaded with a variety of high-resolution graphics displays, requiring 12-Mbit NOR flash, even up to 1-Gbit, and not just the previous car broadcast era only needs 1-Mbit.
Le said: 'In high-performance automotive systems, such as under the hood, except for NOR flash, other non-volatile memories should not be used.'
Le said that performance is ultimately the key to driving NOR flash to dominate more in-car applications. He said: 'We are about to reach the ability to be instant on, because we can really start at about 500MB per second. Processor. ' He added that when you get on the car and turn the car key, you will always want the display and the rear view camera to start in the same second.
Jim Handy, principal analyst at market research firm Objective Analysis, said that 'instant-on' is the reason why car dashboards use NOR flash because it immediately starts basic functions - NOR flash is more suitable for executing code. NAND flash requires special software to control the code. 'Software basically transfers the code from NAND to DRAM, and then everything is executed from DRAM. In fact, you can execute the code directly in NOR flash, but Cannot be executed directly from NAND. '
Handy said that NOR has been used in many parts of today's cars, and will find more applications because it is very beneficial to the automotive subsystem. If the code is very small, then the built-in NOR microcontroller will be available. (MCU); In a more complex system, because of the large amount of code, it will use an external NOR flash chip. Handy said: 'Look at today's autonomous vehicles are equipped with at least one light (LiDAR), each A light NOR flash will be built in to control its various internal functions. '
The industry once thought that NAND flash would cause NOR flash to exit the market, but for a number of reasons, NOR has continued to exist. One of the reasons is that NAND performs better in applications that need to store large amounts of data, but Handy says NAND flash chips. There is a minimum cost requirement, so when it comes to a smaller amount of code, you can't just buy a 50-cent NAND flash chip. He said: 'You can buy a 50-cent NOR flash chip. Because NOR It is more economical for manufacturers to make a small wafer than a NAND manufacturer to make a small wafer.
At the same time, even automotive-grade NAND can't cope with the heat that NOR can withstand, and it doesn't have the reliability of critical automotive applications. Le said long-term availability is also an important feature of NOR flash because Automakers like products that can supply replacement parts for ten years. 'We now even hear the pressure to support 15 years of supply.'
Cypress Semiconductor also has a strong position in automotive NOR flash and has been actively working to address the immediate needs of applications such as Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS). The company recently launched a program called Semper's new NOR flash series.
According to Sam Geha, executive vice president of Cypress Memory Products, this is the first memory built and designed to meet the automotive industry's ISO 26262 functional safety standards, and can be used to create fail-safe, secure embedded automotive systems. Like Wang Hong's NOR flash products, Semper is said to support superior durability and data retention at extreme temperatures common in automotive applications.
Geha said that car safety standards are a key driver for creating a new NOR flash architecture. 'If you are a car supplier, would you want to buy a product that meets safety standards, or buy a low-end product with others?' He also believes that Cypress can Differentiated with its expertise in MCU and SoC.
Of course, the ability to start up instantly is critical, because each car is now equipped with at least one rearview camera for ADAS – requiring the dashboard to start up quickly, which has been one of the key markets for Cypress Hyperbus technology. Geha Say: 'Now we are starting to move towards autonomous driving. There will be no drivers in the car in the future, so we must ensure that this chip does not mess up the car experience.'
But this is not only for dashboards and cameras that require NOR flash. Cypress also sees huge market opportunities in powertrain, engine control systems and chassis control, and because of the extremely high temperature of the car, reliability is critical. Making NOR flash the technology of choice. Geha said that the difference between Semper is its architecture, which is the starting point for Cypress to further import the car's NOR flash – just like stacking Lego blocks, we hope to add it easily. These IP modules can do more. Geha said: 'We will add more important features on this platform.'
Cypress builds the Semper Flash architecture from scratch to meet the needs of the automotive industry, enabling it to function over time.
NOR is not perfect and flawless, but Le said that one of the most important issues at the moment is technology-independent. Since this market is between $1 billion and $2 billion, many players have already withdrawn. Although more opportunities will be It will appear in the near future, but the road of NOR flash will not last forever. Le admits that because NOR flash is difficult to further enhance the technology, it will encounter bottlenecks on the evolution path. 'We are working hard to solve this problem, but this is true It's not easy. ' He said the main obstacle is the limitations of floating gate technology. In fact, this obstacle is no different from the obstacles faced by planar NAND - once the shrinking begins, the reliability of reading is reduced, you have to Adding features such as loss averaging and bad block processing, isn't it? Le said: 'We are getting closer to the NOR limit, but we can still use some techniques to extend this technology.'
NOR flash is also moving in multiple directions. Le said, just like NAND, 3D NOR is also very promising, and related research is underway. Wanghong is beginning to invest in multi-chip packages, which are expected to be in single-wafer and wafer stacks. Reaching the same density. He expects that NOR flash will dominate in 2025, in part because of the long-term supply of vehicles and qualified inspections required in the automotive sector. 'In addition, we are considering using other technologies to continue. '
Handy said that although some people are already studying the 3D NOR architecture, it is still uncertain about the final result. 'It is worth noting that even if Wang Hong mentioned the end of 2025, it refers to a new generation of parts. He said: 'NOR flash can bring long-term supply capacity, so it can still be shipped in large quantities after 20 years of component launch. 'As for NAND, as long as new generation components are introduced, it will almost squeeze out the traditional generation. Components. Handy said: 'Traditional NAND components may last for about 5 years, but traditional NOR flash components may already be 30-year components.'
Compile: Susan Hong