SK hynix's subsidiary Solidigm is considering building a NAND flash fab in the United States, with upstate New York the leading candidate site, Reuters reported on September 18, citing three people familiar with the matter. The sources said the project would be separate from SK hynix's discussions with Intel about making memory at Intel's Ohio site. One source cautioned that no agreement has been reached and key details remain under discussion.

The companies did not confirm a plan. SK hynix said Solidigm "is reviewing various options to strengthen its business competitiveness, but no specific plans have been confirmed." Solidigm said it does not comment on rumors and that no decision has been made. Reuters gave no figures for capacity, capital cost, node or timeline. This is an anonymous-source report of an evaluation, not an announcement.

The core issue is single-site exposure. Solidigm's only NAND fab is in Dalian, China, acquired from Intel in a $9 billion deal closed in 2020. That plant now runs on U.S. permission renewed yearly: the validated end-user status that let it receive chipmaking tools without shipment-by-shipment licenses expired at the end of 2025, and Tom's Hardware reported that the 2026 annual licenses for Dalian and Wuxi are designed to allow continued operation and maintenance rather than unrestricted expansion. In a 3D NAND business where cost per bit depends on migrating to higher layer counts, a fab that can be maintained but not freely upgraded is a slow structural disadvantage. A U.S. site would remove that ceiling and reduce exposure to potential U.S. tariffs.

The policy backdrop is two-sided. Reuters noted that the U.S. Commerce Secretary has threatened tariffs of up to 100% on Korean and Taiwanese firms that do not commit to U.S. production, while Seoul is pressing its chipmakers to invest in a domestic cluster and called the U.S. factory question "a matter of controversy." One source said NAND may draw less Korean resistance than HBM or DRAM because it is seen as less strategically sensitive.

The financial constraint is real. Reuters reported that Solidigm has posted years of losses since the acquisition, and that SK hynix said last month it was reviewing measures to strengthen the unit after reports of a pre-IPO fundraising of about 5 trillion won ($3.6 billion). U.S. production is more expensive than Korean production. Whether a U.S. fab would be funded by SK hynix, by outside capital through an IPO, or by public incentives is not disclosed, and Reuters does not link the two items.

For 2026–27 supply, this changes nothing. A greenfield NAND fab takes years from decision to wafer output, and no decision has been taken. Current NAND tightness driven by AI data-center demand is unaffected, and any output would arrive in a cycle whose demand Reuters itself described as uncertain. Competitive pressure is rising in parallel: CXMT plans a NAND R&D line in Beijing, and Chinese capacity continues to grow.