Toshiba Memory Corp. plans to go public as soon as September, aided by some ¥300 billion ($2.7 billion) in planned investment from the state-backed Development Bank of Japan (DBJ), sources close to the matter said Thursday.
Toshiba Memory, a former chip unit of Toshiba Corp. that was sold to a consortium led by U.S. private equity fund Bain Capital last June, will use the ¥300 billion to buy back preferred shares currently held by four U.S. technology companies in the consortium, including Apple Inc. and Dell Inc., they said. The government-backed Innovation Network Corp. of Japan (INCJ) fund is also considering investing in Toshiba Memory as the company prepares to list on the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, the sources said.
Toshiba Memory may ask for additional funding of several hundreds of billions of yen from its major creditor banks, which have provided loans of ¥600 billion, although the amount would depend on the volume of planned investment by INCJ, they said.
The Bain-led consortium, which included South Korean chipmaker SK Hynix Inc., bought Toshiba Memory for ¥2 trillion.
Bain holds 49.9 percent of the voting rights in the chip company, while Toshiba has reinvested some ¥350 billion to retain 40.2 percent of the rights and Japanese optical glass maker Hoya Corp. has 9.9 percent. Hynix and Apple also own stakes without voting rights.
Toshiba was forced to sell Toshiba Memory, its crown jewel, to bolster finances after incurring huge losses by its now-bankrupt U.S. nuclear unit Westinghouse Electric Co.