SK hynix's $45B New York NAND Plan Reportedly Stalls on China Licences

US officials have held up approval for American chipmaking equipment that SK hynix needs to expand production in China, which complicates plans for new NAND memory plants in New York, Reuters reported on Nov. 3, citing people familiar with the matter. The report is an exclusive built on unnamed sources, and neither the Commerce Department nor the White House had commented when it was published.

SK hynix is seeking US export licences to equip its Dalian plant, and it argues that higher output there would help pay for its US build-out, Reuters said. Commerce has yet to approve the new licences. Solidigm, SK hynix's US unit, plans to invest about $45 billion in two NAND plants in Marcy, New York, according to two of the people, with spending potentially reaching about $100 billion over time. NAND is the memory that keeps data when power is off and fills storage in data centers.

Edaily, a Korean business outlet, carried the same account on Nov. 4 and added nothing beyond Reuters on the licence question, so the claims below rest on one original report.

What the sources say about the talks

Solidigm executives have met Commerce officials nearly 10 times since late August, one person told Reuters. At the late-August meeting, Solidigm co-CEO Richard Chin met Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Under Secretary Jeffrey Kessler, and the officials appeared eager to work things out, the person said. Last week Kessler held to the position that the US does not want to allow more American tools into China to upgrade or expand capacity, according to the source.

Commerce has not formally denied a licence to ship equipment to fill empty cleanroom space in Dalian, the source added, and the two sides are negotiating a separate licence for 2027 to keep the Dalian facility running. SK hynix says filling that space would not expand capacity, because it built the cleanroom in 2023. Treasury, which would have to waive outbound investment restrictions for tool purchases for China, said it would wait and see what Commerce does, one person told Reuters.

Why it matters for storage supply

Voltgrid's angle is where the next NAND capacity lands. In a statement the week before, which Reuters says Solidigm stood by on Nov. 3, the company said it is exploring options for a NAND memory fab at potential locations around the world and that no decision has been made. Reuters's sources say SK hynix needs more and better NAND output from China to generate the revenue to build a US plant. So the Dalian licences, not New York permitting, are the gating item in this account. Nobody has said what a stall would do to supply; that part is our reading, not a reported fact.

The timing is tight. Anthony Picente, the Oneida County executive, said he hopes for an answer in the next couple of weeks, and noted that a federal investment tax credit expires at the end of the year. Leland Miller of the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission told Reuters that none of it goes forward without a green light from the White House.

Background and what is not confirmed

Voltgrid first reported on Oct. 28 that Solidigm was floating a $45 billion US plant tied to Dalian tool approval, and on Oct. 23 that SK hynix halted a US IPO review for Solidigm. SK hynix agreed to buy Intel's Dalian NAND factory for $9 billion in 2020. Commerce revoked foreign chipmakers' blanket authorizations last year, replaced them with annual licences with quantity limits, and said in August 2025 it did not intend to issue licences to upgrade technology or expand capacity at fabs in China, Reuters noted.

Unconfirmed: the $45 billion and $100 billion figures come from unnamed people, not from Solidigm or SK hynix. Commerce, Treasury and the White House had not responded to Reuters, and SK hynix did not respond outside business hours. No licence has been denied or granted, and the outcome is open.