‘Japanese fund may compete for Toshiba’s nand memory division’
The Innovation Network Corp of Japan, a public-private partnership between the Japanese government and major technology companies, may partner with another candidate in the bidding war over the acquisition of Toshiba’s nand memory division.
The Japanese stimulus fund, which is mostly in the hands of the Japanese state, has not made a bid in the first round of the bidding war, but according to sources, the fund is considering contributing as a subordinate partner to a bid from one of the remaining takeover candidates . Reuters reports that.
The Innovation Network Corp of Japan would like to bid with one of these parties because the Japanese government may be able to prevent Toshiba’s memory division from falling into the hands of an unwanted takeover candidate. The Japanese government would like to keep production in Japan, given the strategic value of chip production for future Japanese technology.
The stimulus fund, through board chairman Toshiyuki Shiga, has confirmed that a team has been set up to review publicly available information about the acquisition process. The fund has not yet instituted a due diligence investigation that is common in takeovers and in which all contracts and legally important information are examined. Shiga has said the fund is unable to make an independent offer.
There would still be four takeover candidates in the race: the American chipmaker Broadcom, the also American Western Digital, the South Korean SK Hynix and the Taiwanese Foxconn. Broadcom would now have made the highest offer, converted around 21.5 billion euros. Foxconn would have offered more than 18 billion euros in the first round. SK Hynix and Western Digital would have made bids of around 17 billion euros.
Toshiba splits its nand production into a separate company called Toshiba Memory and sells part of it because it is in financial trouble after a series of financial setbacks. After Samsung, Toshiba is currently the world’s largest nand memory manufacturer.