KIOXIA GP Series SSD Wins Best of Show Award at FMS 2026 for AI Storage Innovation
KIOXIA's GP1 Series PCIe 6.0 SSD receives industry recognition at the 20th anniversary FMS conference for delivering breakthrough performance in AI infrastructure through GPU direct access optimization and 10 million IOPS capability.
KIOXIA GP Series SSD Wins Best of Show Award at FMS 2026 for AI Storage Innovation
Kioxia Corporation's KIOXIA GP Series PCIe NVMe SSD has been named 'Best of Show' in the Specialized Storage category at FMS: the Future of Memory and Storage 2026, held August 4-6 at the Santa Clara Convention Center in California. The award, presented during the event's 20th anniversary celebration, recognizes technologies shaping the future of the memory and storage industry.
The KIOXIA GP1 PCIe 6.0 SSD represents the industry's first Super High IOPS PCIe SSD optimized for GPU direct access, a capability designed specifically for AI infrastructure requirements. The drive delivers up to 10 million random read IOPS with 512-byte data access, powered by KIOXIA XL-FLASH generation 2 low-latency flash memory.
Addressing AI Infrastructure Bottlenecks
Modern AI workloads face significant challenges related to the 'memory wall,' where GPUs remain idle waiting for data from memory systems. Industry reports indicate that traditional systems can experience up to 35 percent of compute time wasted on I/O operations. The GP1 Series addresses this issue by enabling flash storage to function as a high-performance memory extension tier, helping improve GPU utilization for AI applications.
Traditional storage architectures require data to flow from storage to CPU memory before reaching GPU memory, with each transition introducing latency. GPU Direct Storage technology eliminates these CPU bottlenecks by enabling direct memory access between GPUs and storage, bypassing conventional CPU-mediated data paths to reduce latency and increase throughput.
Technical Architecture and Performance
The GP1 Series extends High Bandwidth Memory capability without relying solely on costly in-node HBM or DRAM expansion. Given that HBM represents approximately 30 to 40 percent of total AI accelerator manufacturing costs due to complex 3D stacking technology, the ability to efficiently extend memory capacity with high-performance flash storage offers significant economic advantages for AI system builders.
Built on KIOXIA XL-FLASH generation 2 memory with PCIe 6.0 and NVMe 2.2 interfaces, the architecture leverages Storage Class Memory technology designed to bridge the performance gap between DRAM and conventional flash memory. The PCIe 6.0 specification, released in January 2022, achieves 64 GT/s data rates and doubles the bandwidth of PCIe 5.0 while maintaining backward compatibility.
KIOXIA's second-generation XL-FLASH technology, announced in August 2022, added multi-level cell functionality with 2-bit per cell storage in addition to single-level cell capability, significantly reducing bit cost while maintaining high performance and low latency characteristics. The technology uses BiCS FLASH 3D flash memory architecture and delivers lower latency than standard TLC-based SSDs.
The architecture is designed to scale from the current 10 million random read IOPS to future generations targeting 100 million IOPS, enabling AI systems to efficiently access larger datasets without the constraints of traditional storage bottlenecks.
Industry Recognition and Availability
George Mullins, Conference Director for Future of Memory and Storage, commented on the award:
As AI infrastructure evolves, storage is becoming a critical enabler of next-generation system architectures. The KIOXIA GP Series reflects KIOXIA's continued innovation in flash memory and AI storage technologies. By addressing emerging AI infrastructure requirements with a forward-looking storage architecture, the KIOXIA GP Series stands out as a deserving recipient of this year's FMS Best of Show award in the Specialized Storage category.
Evaluation samples of the KIOXIA GP1 Series will be available to select customers by the end of 2026. The company notes that read and write speeds may vary depending on host devices, software including drivers and operating systems, and specific read/write conditions.
Kioxia Corporation, spun off from Toshiba Corporation in April 2017, continues the legacy of the company that invented NAND flash memory in 1987. The company focuses on developing, producing and selling flash memory and solid-state drives, with its innovative BiCS FLASH 3D memory technology serving applications ranging from smartphones and PCs to data centers and generative AI systems.