Key facts
- YMTC targets at least 60% domestic equipment at the fourth plant, with an ambition of 70%, two sources said.
- The third factory, due to start operating later this year, sources just over half of equipment from Chinese suppliers.
- The fourth plant is expected to make NAND chips with more than 300 layers, aimed at data centers and AI.
- Construction is expected to begin next year; YMTC has held only preliminary supplier talks and placed no formal orders.
- Samsung is converting its Xian factory to 286-layer chips and SK Hynix is upgrading Dalian to 240 layers or more, Reuters previously reported.
- YMTC, Samsung and the US Commerce Department did not respond to requests for comment; SK Hynix declined to comment.
Yangtze Memory Technologies Co plans to source as much as 70% of the equipment for a planned fourth factory in Wuhan from domestic suppliers, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters in a report published on November 6, 2026. The people spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
The company is targeting a domestic-equipment share of at least 60% at the new plant, with an ambition to reach 70%, the people said. That compares with just over half at YMTC's third factory, which is due to begin operating later this year. The timing of the fourth factory and its domestic-equipment target are being reported for the first time.
The fourth plant, in Wuhan where YMTC is based, is expected to make the company's most advanced NAND chips, with more than 300 layers of memory cells stacked vertically, and to focus mainly on storage chips for data centers and artificial intelligence applications, the people said. Construction is expected to begin next year, though YMTC has so far only held preliminary discussions with suppliers and has not placed formal orders.
Most of the additional domestic orders are expected to come from cleaning, polishing and etching stages of production, where Chinese suppliers have already proven their equipment on YMTC's lines, the people said. Chinese firms already supply most of YMTC's cleaning and polishing tools. YMTC remains reliant on overseas suppliers for some sophisticated tools, including lithography and inspection.
The higher local-content target could benefit Chinese equipment makers including Naura Technology Group and Advanced Micro-Fabrication Equipment, the sources said. The US Commerce Department added YMTC to its Entity List in December 2022, imposing licensing requirements on US suppliers seeking to sell certain technology to the company.
Samsung is converting its Xian factory to make 286-layer chips, while SK Hynix is upgrading a Dalian facility to 240 layers or more from 192, Reuters previously reported. YMTC's NAND market share in China rose to 38.5% in the second quarter from 28% in 2025, overtaking Samsung as the top NAND maker in the country, according to data from Omdia. When fully operational, the third, fourth and fifth factories are each expected to process about 100,000 silicon wafers a month, the sources said. YMTC, Samsung and the US Commerce Department did not respond to requests for comment. SK Hynix declined to comment.