This talk will discuss the latest trends in the growth of emerging non-volatile memories and look beyond at the emergence of new computer architectures which will use non-volatile memories for near memory and shared far memory. Emerging non-volatile memory technologies (such as 3D XPoint, MRAM and RRAM) are now available in the data center and in the next generation of AI-based IoT devices. Major foundries are making SoCs with MRAM and RRAM replacing NOR flash and SRAM. Non-volatile memory will play a big role in the data center, at the edge and endpoints.

Emerging memory technologies have gotten a couple of big boosts over the past few years, one in the form of Intel’s Optane products, and the other from the migration of CMOS logic to nodes that NOR flash, and now SRAM, cannot practically support. Although these appear to be two very different spheres, a lot of the work that has been undertaken to support Intel’s Optane products (also known as 3D XPoint) will lead to improved use of persistent memories on processors of all kinds: “xPUs”.