SK Hynix is restarting its Dalian NAND fab expansion — 238-layer flash is the target

SK Hynix is dusting off plans for its second NAND flash factory in Dalian, China, and this time it looks serious. The company is preparing to move in production equipment starting in the second half of 2026, with phased completion targeted by early 2027, according to Korean media reports.

The Dalian second fab was first announced in 2022 with a ceremonial groundbreaking — then shelved as the NAND flash market cratered. Now the calculus has shifted. AI data centers are driving demand not just for DRAM and HBM but for NAND storage too, and SK Hynix needs the capacity.

Its first Dalian fab has already been upgraded to 192-layer NAND. The second facility, once built, will house a new V8 production line for 238-layer NAND flash, targeting 30,000 to 50,000 wafer starts per month.

Korean component suppliers have already begun moving idle NAND equipment to the site, and overseas equipment manufacturers have received initial purchase orders, the reports said. SK Hynix itself confirmed the rising possibility of a restart but stopped short of a firm timeline, telling newstomato that “NAND demand is growing rapidly alongside AI data centers, just like DRAM.”

Inside the company, preparations are accelerating. SK Hynix injected 440.6 billion Korean won (about 1.99 billion RMB) into the Dalian facility last year — a 52% increase from the 289.9 billion won it put in the year before.

Among all of SK Hynix’s NAND production sites, Dalian is the one where additional capacity can come online fastest. The facility already has the shell infrastructure in place from the 2022 announcement. What was waiting was market conditions — and those appear to be turning.

The move mirrors a broader trend. Memory makers across the board are adding NAND capacity as AI-driven storage demand spills beyond data centers into enterprise SSDs and edge devices. SK Hynix’s bet is that demand for high-density, high-layer-count NAND will sustain through the cycle, not repeat the boom-bust pattern that forced the Dalian expansion to pause in the first place.