SanDisk stock jumped 10.84% on Tuesday following a new AI memory milestone with SK Hynix. The companies advanced their ongoing collaboration by releasing the first industry specification for High Bandwidth Flash (HBF) technology.
SanDisk also presents a keynote on AI memory today at the Future of Memory and Storage (FMS) Conference, just hours before its earnings call. Google and Tenstorrent joined the HBF consortium during the standardization process, adding credibility to the new standard.
A New Memory Tier for AI Chips
The Open Compute Project (OCP), an industry group that builds open hardware standards, published the HBF specification this week. The standard gives chip designers a shared framework for using HBF in AI accelerators.
It fills a gap left by High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), which is fast but capacity-constrained. In contrast, solid-state drives hold more data at slower speeds.
The specification supports NAND stacking up to 512GB per die stack. It also defines three performance tiers, with read speeds reaching 3.0 terabytes per second.
SanDisk and SK Hynix started the HBF consortium in February. Google and Tenstorrent joined as members during the specification’s development. SanDisk Chief Technology Officer Alper Ilkbahar called the release a major step for the technology.
“an important milestone for the HBF ecosystem”
Alper Ilkbahar, SanDisk’s chief technology officer, said in a statement.
Earnings Loom as Memory Stocks Rebound
SanDisk reports fiscal fourth-quarter results after markets close today. Wall Street expects earnings near $33 per share on revenue around $8.3 billion, up sharply from $0.29 a year earlier. However, SanDisk shares pulled back in premarket trading Wednesday, as some investors turned cautious ahead of tonight’s results.
SanDisk shares fell roughly 47% last month during a broader memory sector selloff. Meanwhile, SK Hynix shares have swung just as sharply since their Nasdaq debut in July.
The rebound reflects a tighter link between Korean and US markets, as AI infrastructure spending increasingly moves both in tandem.
Today’s earnings will show whether the AI memory story behind Tuesday’s rally holds up under closer scrutiny.