Ni Huangzhong, Chairman of Creative Group, thinks that embedded storage has a bright future, and only high-end products can have domestic substitution. In line with the changes in the current industrial environment, Time Creativity not only began to return to the domestic market, but also aimed at high-threshold embedded storage.
Founded in 2008, Shenzhen Shichuang Electronics Co., Ltd. is a national high-tech enterprise with chip design, software and firmware research and development, packaging testing, manufacturing and application capabilities in the storage field. The company's products and businesses cover SSD solid state drives, DRAM memory modules, embedded memory chips, portable storage products OEM and ODM.
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Aim at embedded storage, starting with 256GB eMMC.
EMMC (Embedded Multimedia Card) is a popular local storage solution for mobile devices, which is mainly composed of flash memory, flash memory controller and EMMC protocol interface, and packaged together in the form of BGA. At present, eMMC is mainly used in consumer electronic products that require high storage capacity, such as mobile phones and tablet computers.
Focusing on the emerging markets brought by 5G and the Internet of Things, and the demand of terminal products for eMMC to improve capacity and performance, the company creatively regards embedded storage as one of the key points of the company's product layout.
Ni Huangzhong introduced that around the core of storage, the company's products involve PC, smart phone and mobile storage consumers. In the mobile storage consumer market, the idea follows the principle of not competing with customers and insists on being an OEM (original equipment manufacturer); However, in industrial markets such as data centers, creativity is needed to bring its own brand. Based on this, the company decided to try a higher level ODM (Original Design Manufacturer) model based on the industry market.
Ni Huangzhong pointed out that the strategy of building independent brands is also to answer the question of the company's future competitiveness.
On 20 18, Shi creatively entered the embedded storage, and set up his own embedded storage chip research and development team in Shenzhen and Taiwan Province province.
In the second quarter of 20 19, Shichuang officially launched its own brand SCY eMMC series products, and gradually expanded from 8GB/ 16GB/32GB to 64 GB/128 G. According to reports, large capacity and high performance are the outstanding highlights of this series of products.
On June 5438+ 10 this year, Shichuang released a 256GB eMMC memory chip with further upgraded capacity. The product conforms to Jedec C5.1standard and backward compatibility 4.5 1 standard, supports HS400 mode, and the reading and writing performance reaches 290MB/s and 220MB/s respectively. Due to the advanced 8-chip stacking technology in the industry, it can meet the demand of capacity upgrading under the size restriction.
"From OTT boxes and tablets to low-end mobile phones, to high-end smart phones and industrial-grade storage; Customers have also gradually changed from small customers in the third and fourth lines to customers in the first and second lines. " How to gradually lay out the embedded memory chip market has already had a clear blueprint.
At present, the mobile phone and other terminal markets have begun to accept UFS flash memory solutions, and UFS has gradually become a new trend. While consolidating eMMC series products, Shichuang also started the research and development of UFS high-end mobile phone memory chips. It is expected that 256GB- 1TBUFS series chips will be launched in the second half of 2002/Kloc-0.
Ni Huangzhong revealed that the self-owned brand SCY products have contributed hundreds of millions of yuan to the company and are expected to become the fastest growing business segment in the future. "After the chips of Changjiang Storage and Changxin Storage were launched, the market mainly promoted eMMC, which ushered in very good development opportunities."
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Supporting high-end positioning with R&D strength
Whether it is launching its own brand or focusing on the high-end market, it all points to the high-end positioning that creativity is committed to. In fact, the embedded storage products that the company focuses on have the characteristics of high threshold.
Ni Huangzhong introduced: "Embedded storage products have the highest threshold among all storage products at present." In addition to the original factory involved in embedded storage products, there are already many manufacturers in China, and there will be more players after the capital is overweight.
But he also stressed: it is easy to come in, but difficult to survive.
On the one hand, embedded storage itself has the characteristics of high technical barriers. "This product type tests the manufacturer's product definition, product development and comprehensive ability to solve problems. Creativity has unique advantages from definition to material selection to packaging to customer response." Although the idea achieved full capacity coverage in less than two years, the accumulation of research and development began as early as 20 13.
On the other hand, it involves the overall business layout of the company. At that time, Creative has continuously improved its product line in the past three years, and the product mix can be flexibly adjusted with the fluctuation of the industry cycle to cope with risks. "The next thing to deal with is the market reaction."
In short, timely creativity not only builds competitiveness with high-end positioning, but also spreads risks with broad business layout. Ni Huangzhong emphasized that what can really support the positioning of high-end products must be the strength of R&D and manufacturing.
According to reports, Shichuang currently has more than 600 employees, of which more than 300 are R&D related personnel. Most of the R&D backbone personnel come from famous universities at home and abroad and have experience in core positions in industry-leading enterprises. The company has established its own R&D teams in Shenzhen, Shanghai and Taiwan Province Province, and set up chip testing laboratories in Shenzhen and Taiwan Province Province.
In addition, the company also cooperated with Shenzhen University to build a joint laboratory for embedded memory chips, focusing on the research and development of cutting-edge technologies for the next generation of memory chips.
Creativity has been committed to building hardware facilities at the level of international manufacturers. At present, more than 80% of the company's R&D and production packaging equipment are world-class and used for the first time in China. With the continuous updating and iteration of facilities and equipment, the company's fixed assets have accumulated from 30 million in 20 16 to 300 million yuan today.
In terms of patents, the company has authorized and is accepting more than 60 invention patents. At the same time, a large proportion of patent reward mechanism has been established within the company. According to the forecast, the company's invention patents will maintain an annual growth rate of 50%. It is understood that the company's latest eMMc product adopts its own patented TLC direct writing and flexible management algorithm, which ensures the product life while achieving high performance.
Ni Huangzhong said: manufacturing and R&D should be upgraded simultaneously; The manufacturing industry is in Baoan, Shenzhen, and where the talents are, the R&D center is located.
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Adhere to the long-term strategy and make the best storage products.
In addition to the emergence of 256GB eMMC products, the most striking news around creativity in recent days is its delivery strength during the epidemic. Ni Huangzhong generously shared his experience on how to establish a reliable delivery capacity and deal with such an unexpected situation as the epidemic.
First of all, the company has established long-term strategic cooperative relations with several major international original factories to ensure the stable supply of raw materials during the epidemic; Secondly, the company is a whole industrial chain company with rich product layout and sufficient raw material inventory. In a special period, the supply of raw materials for some products can also be adjusted to ensure the continuous supply of goods in short supply. In addition, the market pre-judgment ability of the company's decision-making level can also play a role.
Ni Huangzhong believes that warehousing is "the boss's business". In order to survive in the ever-changing storage industry, the decision-making level's judgment is very important. To this end, Ni Huangzhong insists on running three kilometers every day, hoping to meet daily affairs with a good mental state. "Storage is an exciting industry." Based on this understanding, Ni Huangzhong can always remain optimistic.
It is worth mentioning that Shi Chuangyi also achieved a breakthrough in production and sales during the epidemic. In this regard, Ni Huangzhong said that the key to the breakthrough in production and sales this year lies in the company's long-term strategy-insisting on making the best products.
Ni Huangzhong said that this strategy has never changed. Around this goal, the company strives to build the most advanced storage and packaging factory and stacking technology. In addition, whether the storage engineer is the best and whether the management method is appropriate has also become his key index.
According to reports, all the processes of embedded memory chips from product software and hardware design, raw material procurement and selection, packaging and testing to production are completed by themselves, and each link is controlled by themselves, adhering to the best raw material particles and substrates, and adhering to high standards in terms of production yield, product quality consistency, technical support and delivery capacity.
At present, the creative capacity is basically full. "Especially after August, products have been in short supply."
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The slogan of domestic substitution is very loud, and the changes in the political and economic situation affect people's hearts. How do macro variables affect manufacturers at the micro level?
Ni Huangzhong believes that the gradual opening of the market to domestic storage manufacturers is a visible change after 20 18. "In the past, large domestic companies did not believe in domestic chips." In the future, when creativity will gradually increase the domestic market share; In terms of supply, the company also began to try to adopt domestic memory chips.
Besides laying out embedded storage, choosing high-end positioning, adhering to long-term strategy and strengthening cooperation with local supply chains are also positive responses made by creativity around current industrial opportunities.