Toshiba says it has completed the sale of its chip business to a consortium comprised of Bain, Hynix, Apple, Dell, Seagate and Kingston Technology.
Under the new ownership structure of the memory unit, Toshiba and optical products specialist Hoya, will have a 50.1% stake in Toshiba Memory with Toshiba having 40.2% and Hoya having 9.9%.
Bain will be the next largest shareholder.
Hynix’s voting rights are capped at 15% for the next ten years.
Apple, Dell, Seagate and Kingston have no voting rights.
The two Japanese government bail-out funds INCJ and DBJ have been granted ‘instruction rights’ for 16.7% of its voting rights.
Toshiba Memory will continue to be run as a subsidiary of Toshiba.
Hynix will be banned from getting any technological or market information from Toshiba Memory.
Toshiba has pledged to reinvest $3.1 billion, Bain $1.8 billion, Hoya $240 million, Hynix $3.5 billion and the U.S. companies a collective $3.7 billion.
The saga of Toshiba’s attempt to sell the unit has gone on for well over a year.
Foxconn is said to have made a $30 billion bid for the business which was rejected because of fears the technology would leak to China.
Toshiba’s partner in the memory business, Western Digital, held up the sale for several months by challenging Toshiba’s right to sell it.
Then investors pushed for an IPO of the business on the grounds that it would raise much more money than the Bain bid.
Then the Chinese regulator delayed approval for months.
Eventually the unit was sold to a shell company called KK Pangea of which Toshiba owns 40.2% and Hoya 9.9% with INCJ and DBJ having 16.7% of the voting rights and Bain, Hynix, Apple, Dell, Kingston and Seagate owning the rest of the equity .
