Samsung is fond of bragging about its progress on memory chips, but this is one time where it made a particularly notable breakthrough. The Korean firm has started mass production of 16-gigabit LPDDR5 mobile RAM chips that are billed as the first memory ever to be made using extreme ultraviolet lithography, which uses lasers and light-sensitive chemicals to etch silicon. Aside from giving Samsung an edge over rivals, it reportedly clears a “major developmental hurdle” in scaling RAM — this could offer much more room for the industry to grow.

This also translates to some immediate real-world gains, as you might expect. The 6.4Gbps of bandwidth is about 16 percent faster than the 12-gigabit chips seen before, while a 16GB package of chips is about 30 percent thinner. That could lead to slimmer phones or space for components like batteries and cameras.

The rest of the year is also looking surprisingly positive from Samsung’s perspective, as the launch of new game consoles will push sales of RAM chips for their GPUs. It’s also preparing to launch several mobile devices of its own during the Unpacked event next week, including a new Galaxy Note, Galaxy Fold and more.

While we’ve heard a lot about its upcoming mobile plans, Samsung was less specific about its new TV technology. The company is investing billions to build a new plant to produce quantum dot-based TV screens that rival LG’s OLEDs, and will end LCD production entirely by the end of this year. In the release it confirmed that plan, saying “Samsung will continue to meet demand from its LCD customers until the end of the year and accelerate product development based on new technologies such as QD Displays.”

The Exynos 990 follows the launch of the 980 in September — Samsung’s first processor and 5G modem in one– and last year’s Exynos 9820/9825. It supports a 120Hz refresh rate on phone screens, which means smoother gaming and scrolling. It can handle up to six cameras (although only three at once), and has enough guts to manage Samsung’s 108-megapixel image sensor, which was announced over the summer.

The company has also unveiled its Exynos Modem 5123, which works alongside the 990 to bring 5G connectivity to phones, boosting top speeds to 8.36 gigabits per second — a pretty marked improvement on the 3Gbps offered in its previous modem.

Finally, Samsung has announced that it’s started mass producing the industry’s first 12GB low-power double data rate 4X UFS-based multichip package (uMCP). Until now, high-end phones have carried 12GB of RAM through increased capacity chips — six 16Gb RAM chips for one 12GB chip. The new uMCP means only four 24Gb RAM chips are needed to make the same 12GB chip. What does this mean? Increased AI potential and more space for a larger battery, for a start, plus a cost effectiveness that’ll mean we’ll start seeing mid-tier phones getting more RAM in the coming year.

The feature comes with new delivery options: on-demand, which installs features only as they’re needed or in the background; and conditional, which controls which parts of an app to install based on the user’s country, device features or minimum SDK version. Instant experiences are now fully supported, too, so you only need to upload one artefact for your app and Google Play Instant experiences.

According to Google, some 80,000 apps and games using this feature are in production, with average size savings of 20 percent leading to an 11 percent install uplift. This obviously suggests users are more willing to download — and keep hold of — an app that puts less strain on their phone, and will go some way to eradicating that annoying “storage full” notification that plagues hardcore app fans.