Source: Cailian Press
Today (May 27), the domestic DRAM (Dynamic Random-Access Memory) leader—Changxin Technology Group Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Changxin Technology")—successfully passed the review by the STAR Market listing committee and is about to enter the capital market.
As the first "pre-review" project on the STAR Market and a hard-tech behemoth aiming to raise 29.5 billion yuan, Changxin Technology's passage of the review coincides with its tenth anniversary. This is not only a milestone for the company's own development but also marks a crucial step for China's memory chip industry in breaking the long-term overseas monopoly and moving towards self-reliance and controllability.
From Acceptance to Passing Review: Less Than 5 Months
It took Changxin Technology less than five months from IPO acceptance on the STAR Market to passing the review.
As the first company to apply for listing using the IPO "Pre-Review Mechanism" after the STAR Market reform policy in July 2025, Changxin Technology's listing review process was special and high-priority, significantly shortening the listing cycle while avoiding targeted competition from peers due to early disclosure of business and technical information.
Judging from previous rounds of inquiries by the exchange, concerns primarily focused on three core issues: the industry cycle, technological gap, and sustainability of profitability, all directly addressing the pain points of the DRAM industry and key aspects of the company's development.
In response, Changxin Technology stated in its inquiry replies that the DRAM industry is significantly influenced by market supply-demand fluctuations and exhibits pronounced cyclical characteristics. Furthermore, as the supply side of the DRAM market is highly concentrated, with Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Micron Technology holding the vast majority of market share, their capital expenditures are relatively concentrated. Decisions to add or reduce capacity are often released simultaneously, thereby intensifying the industry's cyclical nature and causing significant volatility in DRAM market prices. DRAM products have a high degree of standardization, and the company sets product prices with reference to market prices. Fluctuations in market prices directly affect the company's product unit prices and revenue, thereby impacting its profits.
Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Micron Technology have developed over several decades, possessing first-mover technological advantages and cost advantages, making them more resilient to risks and market shocks. In contrast, Changxin Technology started its development relatively late and is still in the capacity construction and ramp-up phase. Ramping up production capacity for new production lines typically takes multiple quarters, and building a new wafer fab from capital expenditure to capacity release can take several years. Consequently, at this stage, the company still lags behind international leading manufacturers in terms of revenue scale, production capacity scale, and product portfolio. Not only are its production costs relatively higher, but it is also more prone to negative product gross margins or increased inventory write-downs when market competition intensifies and product prices fall compared to leading manufacturers.
In the 2024 global DRAM market, Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Micron Technology held market shares of 40.35%, 33.19%, and 20.73% respectively. Changxin Technology ranked fourth globally and first in China in terms of global market share.
In its inquiries, the exchange also focused on the technological gap between Changxin Technology and the aforementioned overseas leaders, as well as the progress of industry localization.
Changxin Technology has achieved mass production of DDR5/LPDDR5X, filling the domestic gap for general-purpose DRAM. However, a gap still exists in HBM (High Bandwidth Memory) compared to Samsung and SK Hynix.
Changxin Technology stated that after years of development, it has become China's largest, most technologically advanced, and most comprehensively positioned DRAM research, design, and manufacturing integrated enterprise. It has established product portfolios covering the two major mainstream product series: DDR and LPDDR. Moreover, each series can provide the most advanced DDR5, LPDDR5/5X products currently on the market. Its products are widely used in markets such as servers, mobile devices, personal computers, and smart vehicles. The performance of its main products has reached internationally advanced levels, demonstrating strong product competitiveness.
Starting from the second half of 2025, the AI computing power explosion drove a surge in memory prices, allowing Changxin Technology to achieve its first annual profit turnaround. For the full year 2025, the company achieved a net profit attributable to shareholders of 1.875 billion yuan. By the first quarter of 2026, its net profit attributable to shareholders reached 24.762 billion yuan, with a daily profit exceeding 275 million yuan.
In the SSE's inquiry, Changxin was required to disclose its future profit prospects and uncertainties regarding its future development.
Changxin Technology stated that DRAM, as the core hub of artificial intelligence computing power systems, has seen explosive growth in market demand driven by the rapid development of AI and high-speed growth in related infrastructure investment. This was one of the main reasons for the company's performance growth since the second half of 2025.
However, the performance of companies in the DRAM industry is susceptible to cyclical fluctuations. Represented by Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, and Micron Technology, these companies started relatively early and, after years of development and accumulation, have built strong scale, product, and technological advantages, equipping them with a certain degree of resilience against cyclical fluctuations.
Nevertheless, Changxin Technology also stated, "As production capacity continues to be released, the company's production capacity scale is rapidly catching up with the top three international manufacturers, and its competitiveness continues to strengthen. Meanwhile, with product sales achieving rapid growth, the company has developed strong resilience against cyclical fluctuations. Therefore, under the current favorable market expectations, the company expects to achieve profitability in 2026 or 2027, which is reasonable and prudent."
Luxurious Shareholder List, Many A-Share Companies May Benefit
Due to the extremely high upfront production and R&D investments required for storage chip manufacturers using the IDM model, Changxin Technology's development has undergone multiple rounds of financing, ultimately forming a large-scale and diverse shareholder base.
Changxin Technology has no controlling shareholder or actual controller. Its largest shareholder is Hefei Qinghui Jidian Enterprise Management Partnership (Limited Partnership), directly holding 21.67% of the company's shares.
Among Changxin Technology's shareholders are state-backed investors such as the National Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund Phase II (Big Fund II), Anhui Provincial Investment Group, and Guotiao Fund.
Simultaneously, industrial capital like Gigadevice is deeply bound with it, and internet and consumer electronics giants such as Midea Capital, Xiaomi, Alibaba, and Tencent also appear on the shareholder list.
Furthermore, Changxin Technology's early-stage investors include a host of well-known market-oriented investment institutions such as China Merchants Capital, Legend Capital, An Yuan Fund, Cornerstone Capital, Yanchuang Capital, Lanpu Investment, Yunfeng Capital, Yan Yuan Venture Capital, Mingsheng Capital, Qianhai Fund of Funds, and Huafu Jiaye.
On the eve of Changxin Technology's listing, as several listed companies' affiliated funds had previously invested in Changxin, the market derived a related concept sector for Changxin Technology. Every time its listing progress was updated, from its tutoring filing to the review meeting, it attracted high market attention.
In Changxin Technology's latest prospectus, five brokerages—China Merchants Securities, Huaan Securities, China Securities Co., Ltd., Founder Securities, and China International Capital Corporation Limited—appeared, having invested in Changxin Technology through their subsidiaries or participating funds respectively. Considering that Changxin Technology's market capitalization may reach trillions of yuan upon listing, the book value of these brokerages' equity holdings is expected to significantly boost their net profit figures. Brokerage stocks have also been sought after by market funds due to the progress of Changxin's IPO.
Additionally, since the beginning of this year, several listed companies have disclosed their equity investment ties with Changxin Technology through channels such as investor interaction platforms.
Apart from Gigadevice, multiple A-share companies including Infusion, Shangfeng Cement, Hefei Urban Construction, Hefei Department Store Group, and Zhongshan Public Utilities have successively revealed that they had invested in Changxin Technology through their affiliated private equity funds.
According to an announcement disclosed by Gigadevice in 2024, after participating in Changxin Technology's financing with 1.5 billion yuan of its own funds, its shareholding increased to approximately 1.88% post-investment. Infusion indicated on an interactive platform as early as July 2025 that it had made early-stage investments in Changxin Storage. Infusion is a long-term partner and important supplier of Changxin Storage, cooperating with Changxin's Hefei, Beijing, and Shanghai plants. Shangfeng Cement also stated on an interactive platform in October 2025 that the company invested 200 million yuan in Changxin Technology through the private equity investment fund Shanghai Junzhipu Venture Capital Partnership (Limited Partnership), indirectly holding about 0.15% of the shares.
Zhu Yiming's Hardcore Chip Making and Breakthrough Path
In the wave of domestic DRAM breaking through from being "strangled" to achieving breakthroughs, Zhu Yiming is an unavoidable core figure. He single-handedly founded Gigadevice, turning it into the "first domestic storage design stock," and on the other hand, established Changxin Technology, breaking the nearly four-decade DRAM monopoly of Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron, making it the world's fourth-largest memory manufacturer.
Born in 1972 into an ordinary family in Funing, Yancheng, Jiangsu, Zhu Yiming came from a modest background but possessed exceptional talent. At 17, he entered the Physics Department of Tsinghua University with the second-highest college entrance examination score in the county, earning his bachelor's and master's degrees within five years, showcasing his technical aptitude.
In 1997, Zhu Yiming went to the United States for further studies, pursuing a master's degree in Electrical Engineering at Stony Brook University, State University of New York. After graduation, he successively worked at ipolicy Networks Inc. and Monolithic System Technologies Inc., rising from a senior engineer to project leader in the industry, with an annual salary of millions and settled in California. However, a comfortable life never eroded his original aspiration. After years of research and experience in the industry, Zhu witnessed firsthand the transfer of the storage industry from the US to Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, China. He also deeply understood the "stranglehold" situation of China's annual hundred-billion-level chip imports, profoundly realizing that China cannot be "chip-less." "Being chip-less means being soul-less. Without mastering core technologies, the nation's prosperity is built on sand."
In 2004, after accumulating rich experience, Zhu Yiming decided to return to China to start a business, embarking on the path of chip making.
A widely circulated assertion by Zhu Yiming about the storage industry is: If a computer is likened to a crown, the CPU is the jewel on the crown, and the memory is the base of the crown. Naturally, the base requires more gold and jewels. The memory market is the largest in the IC industry; whenever a new process is born, the first thing it makes is memory. As semiconductor processes move into the deep sub-micron era, the proportion of various memory types in integrated circuits gradually increases. Whoever leads memory technology can dominate the entire integrated circuit industry.
In 2005, in a roughcast room at Tsinghua Science Park in Beijing, Zhu Yiming founded "Xin Ji Jia Yi," the predecessor of Gigadevice, with a startup capital of only $920,000. The initial stage of entrepreneurship could be described as a "hellish start." Therefore, in strategic choice, Zhu avoided the crowded DRAM track and chose the relatively niche NOR Flash memory field. Until 2016, Gigadevice was listed on the main board of the Shanghai Stock Exchange, becoming the first domestic memory stock. Today, Gigadevice has grown into the world's second-largest NOR Flash supplier and a leading domestic MCU chip enterprise, with a latest market capitalization of 360 billion yuan.
After what the world saw as "success and fame," Zhu Yiming resolutely turned around, choosing to partner with the Hefei Municipal Government to establish Changxin Technology in May 2016, targeting the DRAM track monopolized overseas, with a total project investment exceeding 50 billion yuan.
In July 2018, Zhu Yiming resigned as General Manager of Gigadevice and took up the positions of Chairman and CEO of Changxin Technology full-time, vowing: "Before Changxin turns a profit, I will not receive a single cent in salary or bonus." For eight years until Changxin Technology achieved its first annual profit in 2025, Changxin continued to incur losses and faced external skepticism that "China cannot make DRAM," but Zhu gritted his teeth and persevered.
In May 2026, as Changxin Technology's STAR Market listing review approached, Zhu Yiming released the largest personal equity incentive plan in A-share history.
The updated prospectus of Changxin Technology shows that Zhu Yiming voluntarily pledged to allocate 50% of his partnership interest in Hefei Jixin Sishiyihao Enterprise Management Partnership (Limited Partnership)—amounting to approximately 768 million shares—to the employees of Changxin Technology and its consolidated subsidiaries over the 10 natural years following the 36th month after Changxin Technology's listing, for employee incentive purposes.
It is noteworthy that the incentive recipients do not include Zhu Yiming himself.
Based on a conservative market estimate of a 2 trillion yuan market capitalization, the incentive value may exceed 20 billion yuan, setting an A-share record for personal equity incentives.
Simultaneously, Zhu Yiming also pledged an ultra-long share lock-up period, promising not to transfer his held shares for the first ten years after Changxin Technology's listing. In the second ten years after the tenth anniversary of the listing, he would sell no more than 20% of the remaining locked shares from the end of the previous year annually. This arrangement of an ultra-long share lock-up period is also relatively rare in A-share history.
An investor familiar with Changxin Technology told the STAR Market Daily reporter that the high-end development of domestic memory has entered a critical stage from breakthrough to volume production, with very broad prospects. Domestic memory enterprises represented by Changxin Technology have already transitioned from followers to runners alongside, and potentially future leaders.
At the technological level, represented by domestically mass-produced DDR5 memory chips entering mainstream server supply chains, domestic DRAM has achieved alignment with international mainstream product generations. At the industrial level, from storage media and chips to systems, China has achieved breakthroughs across the entire chain, with continuously enhancing industrial chain synergy and self-reliance and controllability capabilities. At the market level, AI computing power, data center construction, and the proliferation of smart terminals have created strong and sustained demand pull for high-end memory products such as HBM and DDR5.
