is a Japanese engineer, who has worked for

Toshiba is a Japanese multinational electronics company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure systems, elevators and escalators, electronic components, semiconductors ...

and

Tohoku University is a public research university in Sendai, Miyagi, Japan. It is colloquially referred to as or . Established in 1907 as the third of the Imperial Universities, after the University of Tokyo and Kyoto University, it initially focused on sc ...

, and is currently chief technical officer (CTO) of Unisantis Electronics. He is best known as the inventor of

flash memory Flash memory is an Integrated circuit, electronic Non-volatile memory, non-volatile computer memory storage medium that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. The two main types of flash memory, NOR flash and NAND flash, are named for t ...

, including the development of both the NOR flash and

NAND flash Flash memory is an Integrated circuit, electronic Non-volatile memory, non-volatile computer memory storage medium that can be electrically erased and reprogrammed. The two main types of flash memory, NOR flash and NAND flash, are named for t ...

types in the 1980s. He also invented the first gate-all-around (GAA)

MOSFET upright=1.3, Two power MOSFETs in amperes">A in the ''on'' state, dissipating up to about 100 watt">W and controlling a load of over 2000 W. A matchstick is pictured for scale. In electronics, the metal–oxide–semiconductor field- ...

( GAAFET) transistor, an early non-planar 3D transistor, in 1988.

Biography

Masuoka attended

Sendai is the capital Cities of Japan, city of Miyagi Prefecture and the largest city in the Tōhoku region. , the city had a population of 1,098,335 in 539,698 households, making it the List of cities in Japan, twelfth most populated city in Japan. ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, where he earned an undergraduate degree in engineering in 1966 and doctorate in 1971. He joined

in 1971. There, he invented stacked-gate avalanche-injection

metal–oxide–semiconductor upright=1.3, Two power MOSFETs in amperes">A in the ''on'' state, dissipating up to about 100 watt">W and controlling a load of over 2000 W. A matchstick is pictured for scale. In electronics, the metal–oxide–semiconductor field- ...

(SAMOS) memory, a precursor to electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM) and

. In 1976, he developed

dynamic random-access memory Dynamics (from Greek language, Greek δυναμικός ''dynamikos'' "powerful", from δύναμις ''dynamis'' "power (disambiguation), power") or dynamic may refer to: Physics and engineering * Dynamics (mechanics), the study of forces and t ...

(DRAM) with a double poly-Si structure. In 1977 he moved to Toshiba Semiconductor Business Division, where he developed 1 Mb DRAM. Masuoka was excited mostly by the idea of

non-volatile memory Non-volatile memory (NVM) or non-volatile storage is a type of computer memory that can retain stored information even after power is removed. In contrast, volatile memory needs constant power in order to retain data. Non-volatile memory typ ...

, memory that would last even when power was turned off. The EEPROM of the time took very long to erase. He developed the "floating gate" technology that could be erased much faster. He filed a

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

in 1980 along with Hisakazu Iizuka. His colleague Shoji Ariizumi suggested the word "flash" because the erasure process reminded him of the flash of a camera. The results (with capacity of only 8192 bytes) were published in 1984, and became the basis for

technology of much larger capacities. Masuoka and colleagues presented the invention of NOR flash in 1984, and then

at the ''

IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is an American 501(c)(3) organization, 501(c)(3) public charity professional organization for electrical engineering, electronics engineering, and other related disciplines. The IEEE ...

1987 International Electron Devices Meeting'' (IEDM) held in San Francisco. Toshiba commercially launched NAND flash memory in 1987. Toshiba gave Masuoka a few hundred dollar bonus for the invention, and later tried to demote him. But it was the American company

Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer compo ...

which made billions of dollars in sales on related technology. Toshiba's press department told Forbes that it was Intel that invented flash memory. In 1988, a Toshiba research team led by Masuoka demonstrated the first gate-all-around (GAA)

( GAAFET) transistor. It was an early non-planar 3D transistor, and they called it a "surrounding gate transistor" (SGT). He became a professor at Tohoku University in 1994. Masuoka received the 1997

IEEE Morris N. Liebmann Memorial Award The initially called Morris Liebmann Memorial Prize provided by the Institute of Radio Engineers (IRE), the IEEE Morris N. Liebmann Memorial Award was created in 1919 in honor of Colonel Morris N. Liebmann. It was initially given to awardees who h ...

of the

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is an American 501(c)(3) public charity professional organization for electrical engineering, electronics engineering, and other related disciplines. The IEEE has a corporate office ...

. In 2004, Masuoka became the chief technical officer of Unisantis Electronics aiming to develop a three-dimensional transistor, based on his earlier surrounding-gate transistor (SGT) invention from 1988. In 2006, he settled a lawsuit with Toshiba for ¥87m (about US$758,000). He has a total of 270 registered patents and 71 additional pending patents. He has been suggested as a potential candidate for the

Nobel Prize in Physics The Nobel Prize in Physics () is an annual award given by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for those who have made the most outstanding contributions to mankind in the field of physics. It is one of the five Nobel Prizes established by the ...

, along with Robert H. Dennard who invented single-transistor DRAM.

Recognition

*1997 -

*2007 - Medal with Purple Ribbon *2013 - Person of Cultural Merit *2016 - Order of the Sacred Treasure, Gold and Silver Star *2018 - Honda Prize

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Masuoka, Fujio 1943 births 21st-century Japanese inventors Living people People from Takasaki, Gunma Toshiba people Tohoku University alumni Academic staff of Tohoku University