Spansion Japan Ltd., a unit of U.S. flash memory maker Spansion Inc., filed for bankruptcy protection Tuesday with ¥74.1 billion in debt, Teikoku Databank said.
Spansion Japan's debt is the biggest left by a manufacturer in Japan so far this year. It filed for protection from creditors under the Corporate Rehabilitation Law at the Tokyo District Court, the private research company said.
The unit, which produced flash memory chips for cell phones and other digital electronics, saw performance deteriorate under pressure from the global economic slump and its investment in a plant it was expanding in Fukushima Prefecture, Teikoku said.
The company was founded as a joint venture between Fujitsu Ltd. and U.S. semiconductor manufacturer Advanced Micro Devices Inc. in 1993. It became a Spansion subsidiary in 2003. Spansion is also a Fujitsu-AMD joint venture.