The semiconductor industry is expected to allocate the largest portion of its capex spending for flash memory again in 2019, marking the third consecutive year that flash has led all other segments in spending, according to IC Insights.

Flash memory trailed the foundry segment in capex in 2016, but took an extra-large jump in 2017, said IC Insights. Flash capex surged 92% to US$27.6 billion in 2017, and increased another 16% to US$31.9 billion in 2018 as manufacturers expanded and upgraded their production lines for 3D NAND to meet growing demand.

With much of the expansion now completed or expected to be wrapped up in 2019, flash capex is forecast to decline 18% this year to US$26.0 billion, which still is a very healthy spending level, IC Insights noted.

SK Hynix completed and opened its new wafer fab facility in Cheongju (South Korea) dubbed M15 in 2018. First devices produced from the factory were 72-layer 3D NAND flash, IC Insights said. Also during the year, fellow company Micron Technology allocated significant resources to upgrade its two existing flash fabs in Singapore and broke ground on construction of a third NAND wafer fab there.

Toshiba Memory completed construction of a new 300mm wafer plant dubbed Fab 6 at its Yokkaichi (Japan) site in the first half of 2018. Operations at Phase one of the facility are expected to begin in early 2019. Also, Toshiba announced that its next flash memory fab after Fab 6 would be located in Kitakami, Iwate. The company broke ground on this fab in July 2018, IC Insights continued.

Meanwhile, China's XMC/Yangtze River Storage Technology (YMTC), which is owned by Tsinghua Unigroup, in 2018 completed construction of its new fab, installed equipment, and began small-volume production of 32-layer 3D NAND flash, IC Insights indicated.

In addition, Samsung and other major flash suppliers are well aware of the big plans that China has to be a player in the 3D NAND flash market, IC Insights identified. Samsung will continue to invest heavily to stay far ahead of existing competitors or new startups and maintain its competitive edge against any who think they can wrestle marketshare away.

Samsung spent US$13.0 billion on flash capex in 2017 and US$9 billion in 2018, accounting for 28% of the total US$31.9 billion in flash memory capital spending last year. IC Insights forecast that Samsung will spend another US$7 billion for flash capex in 2019.