China's top flash-memory chipmaker YMTC begins pre-IPO coaching with investment bank

BEIJING, May 19 (Reuters) - China's ‌top flash ​memory ​chipmaker YMTC has begun the so-called "tutoring" process for a potential initial public offering, where a company ‌receives formal pre-IPO guidance from an investment bank, a ⁠regulatory filing showed on Tuesday.

Yangtze Memory Technologies Co (YMTC) has hired CITIC ‌Securities, a Chinese state-owned ‌investment bank, to guide its IPO preparation ahead of a potential stock market listing.

YMTC's IPO preparations follow that of ​Hefei-based Changxin Memory Technologies (CXMT), which revealed in an updated prospectus on Sunday that it was profitable for the ⁠first time in its history last year, while its first quarter revenue jumped ​more than 700% year on year.

YMTC and CXMT are seen as China's best hopes for establishing ​a foothold in a global memory ‌chip market long dominated by South Korean and U.S. players such as Samsung Electronics, SK ⁠Hynix and Micron.

Despite being added to a U.S. trade blacklist in late 2022, which curtailed its access to foreign chipmaking tools, the ⁠Wuhan-based company has expanded its use of domestic equipment suppliers such ​as Naura and is aggressively adding capacity.

The China's largest maker of NAND flash memory chips--that store data in smartphones and computers--has two factories ‌with a combined monthly output of 200,000 wafers.

YMTC's third factory in Wuhan should start operations ‌late this year, and has capacity to produce 50,000 wafers ⁠per month by 2027, ‌Reuters has reported ​previously.

(Reporting by Pan Che, Eduardo Baptista, Shi Bu and Ryan Woo; Editing by Bernadette Baum and Kate ‌Mayberry)

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