SK hynix Selects Five Outstanding Industry-Academic Inventions to Identify Next-Generation Memory Technologies

[Financial News] SK hynix announced on the 16th that it held the 2026 Awards Ceremony for Outstanding Inventions from Industry-Academic Research Projects at the guesthouse of its Icheon Campus.
The awards ceremony recognizes and encourages inventions developed through joint research with universities that have demonstrated clear technological achievements and high patent value. SK hynix has held the ceremony annually since 2013.
This year, the company reviewed 26 industry-academic patents filed last year and selected five inventions: one Grand Prize winner, one Excellence Award winner, and three Encouragement Award winners.
The Grand Prize went to a patent by Professor Choi Woo-seok of Seoul National University for a circuit design enabling next-generation multilevel signal transmission. The technology enables fast, low-energy data transfers between computing chips and memory while reducing power-supply noise in high-speed memory interfaces.
Through actual measurements, the researchers confirmed that the improved circuit could transmit data more reliably than the “PAM3” method, which carries three voltage levels on a single line. The patent was jointly filed by the researchers and SK hynix.
The Excellence Award went to a patent by Professor Kim Hyung-jun of Yonsei University concerning electrode materials and device characteristics for next-generation memory. The technology controls the characteristics of electrodes used in high-density memory through a single process variable. It received high marks for presenting quantitative data at a level applicable to actual product development.
The Encouragement Awards went to patents related to “high-temperature ALD and CVD processes for depositing materials for vertical SOM cells” by Professor Hwang Cheol-seong of Seoul National University; “high-temperature ALD and CVD precursors and processes for next-generation memory” by Professor Byung Joon Choi of Seoul National University of Science and Technology (SeoulTech); and “high-speed interface circuits for UFS 5.0 and next-generation MIPI M-PHY” by Professor Han Jae-deok of Hanyang University.
Cha Sun-yong, head of SK hynix’s Future Technology Research Institute, said, “We expect outstanding patents identified through industry-academic collaboration to help strengthen the technological competitiveness of Korea’s semiconductor industry.” He added, “We will continue providing active support so that challenging and innovative research can be carried out more vigorously in the future.”

[email protected] Park Ji-yeon Reporter