Toshiba to boost NAND flash memory output

TOKYO: Japan's Toshiba Corp. said on Wednesday it would more than double its planned output this year of NAND flash memory chips at a new factory in Yokkaichi, western Japan, to meet soaring demand.

Toshiba said it would increase monthly output at the plant to the equivalent of 21,500 300-mm silicon wafers by the end of 2005, compared to its initial plan to ramp up output to the equivalent of 10,000 wafers.

The larger-sized wafers can yield more than twice as many chips per wafer as the standard 200-mm variety, helping microchip makers cut costs and offer competitively priced products.

The faster ramp-up this year, however, does not change the original plan to bring output to the equivalent of 40,000 wafers a month by the first half of 2007 with a total investment of 270 billion yen ($2.54 billion), a Toshiba spokesman said.

The plant is owned by Flash Partners, a joint venture held 50.1 percent by Toshiba and 49.9 percent by SanDisk Corp., the world's largest supplier of flash data storage cards.

NAND flash memory chips, which are rewriteable and do not require power to retain information, are widely used in digital cameras and camera-equipped mobile phones.

Demand has picked up in recent months amid brisk sales of NAND flash-based portable music players such as Apple Computer Inc.'s iPod Shuffle.

Toshiba expects global demand for NAND flash memory chips to grow to 2.1 trillion yen in 2008 from 700 billion yen in 2004.