The capacitive coupling between two adjacent bitlines of a NAND memory device is relevant and this may be exploited for boosting the voltage of bitlines that are not to be programmed in order to inhibit program operations on them.
According to the disclosed method, first the even (odd) bitlines that include cells not to be programmed (BLE ,...,BLE ) are biased with a first voltage for inhibiting them from being programmed, typically the supply voltage (VDD), while the even (odd) bitlines that include cells to be programmed are grounded. Successively, the adjacent odd (even) bitlines (BLO ,...,BLO ) are biased at the supply voltage (VDD) or at an auxiliary voltage, for boosting the bias voltage of the even (odd) bitlines above the supply voltage.
With this expedient, the bias voltage of the even (odd) bitlines that include cells not to be programmed is boosted because of the relevant parasitic coupling capacitances between adjacent bitlines. Therefore, no dedicated charge pump generator is needed.