Yangtze Memory Technologies (YMTC), China’s largest maker of NAND flash memory, filed on Aug. 21 for a Shanghai initial public offering that could raise about $4.9 billion. The filing came less than two weeks after Counterpoint Research estimated that YMTC held 14% of global NAND shipments in the second quarter, matching Japan’s Kioxia and placing it behind Samsung Electronics and the combined SK hynix-Solidigm group. The figures indicate YMTC has moved beyond its earlier reputation as a low-end challenger and emerged as a significant competitor in the global memory market.