Toshiba and SanDisk Collaborate on New NAND Factory

Now that it has, more or less, finished with the largest part of new PC releases, Toshiba seems to have decided upon focusing on a different aspect of its business. Apparently, the company figured it was time for a serious boost to its NAND Flash memory offering. As such, it approached SanDisk, another major NAND Flash player, with the express purpose of setting up a joint venture. Sure enough, the latter agreed and the two have already started work on their new factory.

In truth, the so-called Fab 5 that has just entered construction was supposed to be built between last year and this year, but was delayed because of the economic crisis. Fortunately, this turmoil, at least to some extent, has waned now, allowing the two to actually start the foundation in the Mie Prefecture, Japan. This new fab is meant to provide all the necessary NAND chips for such things as smartphones, tablets and solid state drives.

The factory should be completed by Spring 2011 and will have a ground area of 38,000 m2. Basically, it will start off making 20-nanometer class NAND, with more advanced nodes slated to be implemented later on. Having a fab like this on hand will likely allow the partners to keep up with the growing popularity of solid state drives and Flash solution in general. What's more, since both Toshiba and SanDisk are contributing with financial investments, the factory will have the status of joint venture and will see each of the partners getting their share of the chip output. Output allocations will depend on the proportionate level of equipment funding.

Fab 5 will be comparable, in size, to Toshiba's Fab 4, but will be more mindful to environment-friendliness. Among the benefits will be LED lighting, for lower energy costs, and even a 12% reduction in CO2 emissions.