[News] AI, HBM Drive Memory Testing Demand: How China’s Suppliers Are Challenging an 80%-Import Market

The rapid growth of AI is reshaping the DRAM and HBM markets, increasing demand for specialized equipment to test advanced memory chips. According to ijiwei, the global memory testing equipment market has long been dominated by overseas suppliers, though Chinese equipment makers are gradually making inroads. Imported equipment still accounts for more than 80% of China’s installed base across back-end testing processes.

Advantest and Teradyne Dominate Memory Testing Equipment

At the center of this overseas dominance are Advantest and Teradyne. Advantest, a leading supplier of DRAM and HBM testing equipment, works closely with Samsung Electronics, SK hynix, and Micron, according to ijiwei. Its latest V93000 HS2 platform supports parallel testing of multi-stack HBM chips, improving testing efficiency by 40% compared with the industry average. Advantest currently holds more than 50% of the global memory chip testing equipment market, the report notes.

Teradyne focuses on high-end DRAM testing, particularly for server memory. It supplies final-test (FT) equipment for DRAM used with Intel Xeon processors, as well as three-temperature handlers and SLT equipment for SK hynix HBM modules used in AI servers. Teradyne holds around 30% of the global server memory testing equipment market, second only to Advantest.

The growing complexity of HBM is also driving demand for more advanced testing equipment. According to ETNews, Digital Frontier and UniTest have secured a combined KRW 283.94 billion in HBM4 wafer tester orders from SK hynix this year, including KRW 232.1 billion for Digital Frontier and KRW 51.84 billion for UniTest. As HBM advances, more items need to be tested and testing times are getting longer, potentially allowing equipment demand to grow faster than HBM output itself. Starting with HBM4, memory makers are also increasingly turning to dedicated testing equipment.

Chinese Suppliers Make Inroads in Memory Testing Equipment

Chinese suppliers are also gaining ground, with TBSTest, MaxOneSemi, ChangChuan Technology, and SEICHITECH among the domestic companies increasingly competing in the market, according to ijiwei.

TBSTest has emerged as an important Chinese supplier of memory Automated Test Equipment (ATE) systems. In 2024, its independently developed TM8000 series entered mass production at a leading Chinese memory manufacturer, making it the third supplier globally, after Advantest and Teradyne, capable of providing ATE equipment for both chip probing (CP) and final testing (FT) in DRAM volume production.

Over the past year, TBSTest has secured orders for more than 300 systems from several leading memory customers in China and overseas, and is expected to capture nearly 15% of China’s memory ATE market in 2026. Its portfolio covers DRAM, including DDR, LPDDR, and HBM, as well as NAND and NOR flash.

SEICHITECH is also making progress in reliability dynamic burn-in (RDBI) testing. Its independently developed RDBI equipment for DDR chips completed performance validation at a leading Chinese memory manufacturer in 2025, making it another supplier capable of providing burn-in equipment for DDR production testing after Advantest, DI, UniTest, YIKC, and TytanTest, the report notes.

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(Photo credit: ChangChuan Technology)