YMTC Targets 70% Domestic Tools for Fourth NAND Fab in Wuhan

Yangtze Memory Technologies plans to source as much as 70% of the equipment for a planned fourth NAND factory from domestic suppliers, with a floor of at least 60%, Reuters reported, citing sources. At YMTC's third factory, Chinese suppliers provide just over half of equipment purchases.

The new plant, to be built in Wuhan, will target YMTC's most advanced NAND flash, which stacks more than 300 layers of memory cells. Each of factories three, four and five is designed to process around 100,000 silicon wafers a month, and the fourth would mostly serve data centers and AI workloads.

Per the report, "most of the additional domestic orders are expected to come from workhorse stages of production, including cleaning, polishing and etching wafers." That maps to AMEC, Naura Technology Group and Piotech, the three names already qualified at the third fab. Lithography and inspection tools still have to be bought abroad.

Construction is expected to begin next year. YMTC has so far only held preliminary discussions with suppliers and has not placed formal orders.

The Wuhan chipmaker has been on the US Commerce Department's Entity List since December 2022, which cuts it off from US-made tools. It still took 38.5% of China's NAND market in the second quarter, up from 28% in 2025, per Omdia figures cited in the report. For comparison, Samsung Electronics has been converting its Xian factory to 286-layer chips, and SK Hynix is upgrading its Dalian facility from 192 to 240 layers.

This fits the pattern we have been tracking around Beijing's push to insulate its chip stack from US controls, including this week's pile-up of Nvidia H200s in Hong Kong as import approvals stall.