Toshiba Misses Deadline to Find a Buyer for Its Chip Business
Instead, the company said it was still weighing offers from three groups of investors: Bain Capital, the American investment fund, which has joined with two Japanese government-backed financial firms; Western Digital, the digital storage company based in the United States; and Foxconn, the contract manufacturer based in Taiwan
that makes phones and other devices on behalf of Apple and other global brand names.
In June, Toshiba said that it was entering exclusive talks with the Bain group, which also included a Japanese government-controlled investment
fund, the Innovation Network Corporation; the Development Bank of Japan, a state-owned bank; and SK Hynix, the South Korean technology company
TOKYO — Toshiba, the embattled Japanese conglomerate, said on Thursday
that it needed more time to choose an outside investor for its microchip business, extending a period of uncertainty for the company as it seeks a multi-billion-dollar cash infusion to stabilize its finances.
Toshiba said in a statement that it had “exercised its best efforts to reach a mutually satisfactory definitive agreement” but
that negotiations had “not reached the point” at which the board was able to make a decision.
It was the second time that Toshiba missed a self-imposed deadline to complete a deal for the
business, which analysts say could be worth upward of 2 trillion yen, or around $18 billion.
