HP to Begin Mass Production of Memristors

HP has agreed a deal with the world’s second largest memory chip maker, Hynix, that will see the mass production of memristors for the first time. If everything goes according to plan, the first memristors – which could replace memory chips or even hard drives, could become widely available in about three years.

Sometimes described as the “missing link” in electronics i.e. the fourth element in addition to the resistor, capacitor and inductor, memristors could significantly provide greater memory storage that uses far less space and energy. Furthermore, memristors are much simpler than transistors in principle and with further development could actually replace the actions of billions of transistors that make up the modern micro-processor.

The HP and Hynix partnership will now work towards developing memristor memory chips otherwise known as resistive random access memory (ReRAM), with the aim of having the products available for mass distribution by 2013. However, there are doubts as to how successful memristors will eventually become in the market particularly if they end up becoming more expensive than existing technology.

Talking Point

Would you pay more for technology that guarantees better performance, speed and efficiency?