IBM Develops New Type of Memory That's 100x Faster Than Flash!

For the first time, scientists at IBM Research have demonstrated that a relatively new memory technology, known as phase-change memory (PCM), can reliably store multiple data bits per cell over extended periods of time. This significant improvement advances the development of low-cost, faster and more durable memory applications for consumer devices, including mobile phones and cloud storage, as well as high-performance applications, such as enterprise data storage. With a combination of speed, endurance, non-volatility and density, PCM can enable a paradigm shift for enterprise IT and storage systems within the next five years.

Scientists have long been searching for a universal, non-volatile memory technology with far superior performance than Flash – today's most ubiquitous non-volatile memory technology. The benefits of such a memory technology would allow computers and servers to boot instantaneously and significantly enhance the overall performance of IT systems. A promising contender is PCM that can write and retrieve data 100 times faster than Flash, enable high storage capacities and not lose data when the power is turned off. Unlike Flash, PCM is also very durable and can endure at least 10 million write cycles, compared to current enterprise-class Flash at 30,000 cycles or consumer-class Flash at 3,000 cycles. While 3,000 cycles will out live many consumer devices, 30,000 cycles are orders of magnitude too low to be suitable for enterprise applications. (see chart for comparisons).

"As organizations and consumers increasingly embrace cloud-computing models and services, whereby most of the data is stored and processed in the cloud, ever more powerful and efficient, yet affordable storage technologies are needed," states Dr. Haris Pozidis, Manager of Memory and Probe Technologies at IBM Research – Zurich. "By demonstrating a multi-bit phase-change memory technology which achieves for the first time reliability levels akin to those required for enterprise applications, we made a big step towards enabling practical memory devices based on multi-bit PCM."


The PCM research project at IBM Research - Zurich will continue to be studied at the recently opened Binnig and Rohrer Nanotechnology Center.

Read More