Kioxia Corporation and Western Digital Corp. (NASDAQ: WDC) have finalized a formal agreement to jointly invest in the first phase of the Fab7 (Y7) manufacturing facility at Kioxia's industry-leading Yokkaichi Plant in the Mie Prefecture of Japan. With construction of the first phase of Y7 completed, the joint-venture investment will enable initial production output beginning in the fall of this year. This marks another important milestone in the 20-year strategic joint-venture partnership between the two companies.
"We are very pleased to further deepen our strategic partnership with Western Digital through this joint investment in Y7," said Nobuo Hayasaka, President and CEO of Kioxia. "The rapid digitization of societies underpins accelerating use of memory products. We will continue to leverage our technological partnership and economies of scale to develop and produce cutting-edge semiconductor products and achieve organic corporate growth."
"This joint investment in Y7 accentuates our productive and positive relationship with Kioxia, underscoring our substantial global share in memory, the ongoing importance of memory and storage and our multi-faceted commitment to Japan," said Dr. Siva Sivaram, President, Technology & Strategy, Western Digital. "Our strategic partnership with Kioxia has led to the introduction of leading-edge technology while increasing the scale of manufacturing and R&D capabilities. We look forward to continuing to drive long-term success together."
This joint-venture investment adds a sixth flash memory manufacturing facility to the Yokkaichi Plant, enhancing its position as the world's largest flash memory manufacturing site. The first phase of the Y7 facility will produce 3D flash memory including 112- and 162-layer and future nodes.
Kioxia and Western Digital will continue to maximize synergies through joint development of 3D flash memory and joint investment in line with market trends to strengthen their respective competitiveness and extend their leadership in the memory space.
About Kioxia
Kioxia is a world leader in memory solutions, dedicated to the development, production and sale of flash memory and solid-state drives (SSDs). In April 2017, its predecessor Toshiba Memory was spun off from Toshiba Corporation, the company that invented NAND flash memory in 1987. Kioxia is committed to uplifting the world with memory by offering products, services and systems that create choice for customers and memory-based value for society. Kioxia's innovative 3D flash memory technology, BiCS FLASH™, is shaping the future of storage in high-density applications, including advanced smartphones, PCs, SSDs, automotive and data centers.
About Western Digital
Western Digital is on a mission to unlock the potential of data by harnessing the possibility to use it. With both Flash and HDD franchises, underpinned by advancements in memory technologies, we create breakthrough innovations and powerful data storage solutions that enable the world to actualize its aspirations. Core to our values, we recognize the urgency to combat climate change and have committed to ambitious carbon reduction goals approved by the Science Based Targets initiative. Learn more about Western Digital and the Western Digital®, SanDisk® and WD® brands at www.westerndigital.com.
