Toshiba Corporation today announced that its board of directors, meeting today, has agreed upon a FY2017 investment program for its wholly owned subsidiary, Toshiba Memory Corporation (TMC), that will channel approximately 180 billion yen into Fab 6 at Yokkaichi Operations, TMC’s Flash memory facility. The investment will cover installation of manufacturing facilities in Phase-1 of the fab, and the construction of Phase-2.
Production at Fab 6 will be entirely devoted to BiCS FLASH, Toshiba's innovative 3D Flash memory. As detailed in Toshiba’s February 9, 2017 announcement “Toshiba Starts Construction of Fab 6 and Memory R&D Center at Yokkaichi, Japan”, Phase-1 of the fab is scheduled for completion in summer 2018, and the current round of investment will ensure this target date is met. Demand for Flash memory is expected to see continued strong growth from data centers and enterprise servers, which will accelerate demand for 3D Flash memories. This understanding guided the board in making today’s decision.
The investment in Fab 6 will enable TMC to install manufacturing equipment for 96-layer 3D Flash memories, including deposition and etching equipment. In parallel with this, construction of Phase-2 of Fab 6 is scheduled to start in September this year, with a completion target of the end of 2018. Specific production capabilities and schedules will be aligned with market demand.
TMC has recently asked SanDisk, its partner in joint ventures for investment in manufacturing equipment at TMC’s Yokkaichi Operations, to clarify whether it intends to jointly invest in the Fab 6 facility. If SanDisk does not agree to such joint investment, TMC will invest alone in manufacturing equipment for separate TMC capacity.
The investment decided today is included in the three years investment plan of 360 billion yen announced on March 17, 2016 “Notice of Construction of New Semiconductor Fabrication Facility.”
