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Huawei just released a new storage device designed for AI inference and data centers with capacities of 61.44TB and 122.88TB; a 245TB variant is expected to arrive in the future. What made these SSDs interesting, though, was not their massive capacities but the technology behind them. Since the company cannot acquire high-layer-count 3D NAND chips from foreign suppliers needed for high-capacity storage, it instead uses Die-on-Board (DoB) packaging to mount more NAND dies directly on the PCB. Blocks & Files reported that this allowed the company to cram more NAND dies without stacking, thereby increasing density to circumvent BGA/TSOP packaging limits.
Samsung already announced 3D NAND with more than 400 layers, but these chips use American technology that is off-limits to Huawei. The U.S. Department of Commerce added Huawei to its Entity List in 2019, effectively cutting off the company from U.S.-origin technology. Aside from making it difficult, if not impossible, to buy American hardware, software, and IP, it also barred the company from accessing any technology based on or made with U.S. input. So, because the most advanced 3D NAND chips use American technology, even non-U.S. companies making them, like Samsung or SK hynix, cannot sell these chips to Huawei.
YMTC, China’s premier storage chip maker, offers its Xtacking 4.0 3D NAND tech, but it’s limited to 232 layers. This less-dense layout puts Huawei at a disadvantage, as its SSDs would have less capacity than competitors’ offerings that use more advanced 3D NAND. But instead of waiting on its suppliers to catch up, the Chinese tech giant’s researchers used their creativity to build an alternative that skirted Washington’s sanctions through DoB packaging.
DoB ditches traditional NAND packaging and puts the NAND dies directly on the SSD’s PCB. This allows Huawei to increase the capacity of its storage devices while using YMTC’s less dense NAND dies. Aside from that, it’s also more cost-effective than traditional NAND packaging as it eliminates several expensive processes. Still, Huawei had to address several challenges when using DoB, such as thermal management and signal integrity, but it seems to have addressed them with the launch of its OceanDisk 1800.
Even though Huawei has been locked out of American tech for several years now, it continues to thrive and remains one of the biggest tech companies in China and around the world. It has also continued to innovate in response to the limitations that Washington placed on it, sometimes relying on sheer numbers to achieve parity. For example, the AI CloudMatrix cluster could beat the Nvidia GB200 in performance, but it uses 4x the power to do so.
As Beijing continues to block the Nvidia H200 at the border, even expanding the import ban to the RTX 5090D V2, Chinese AI firms have no choice but to buy locally made AI chips like those from Huawei. This, in turn, would funnel a ton of revenue toward Chinese chipmakers, allowing them to invest more in research and development and to decouple from U.S. tech.
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