Japan is set to become the anchor of a $31.4B flash memory buildout as Kioxia and SanDisk map out six years of NAND capacity spending, with CEO Hiroo Ota seeking government help for roughly a third of the cost.
About $11.3B of the program goes to Kitakami, where Ota says the company’s most advanced NAND will be made at a facility set to become its primary hub. Expansion there, he added, should be substantial.
David Goeckeler, who runs SanDisk, tied the outlay to the pair’s flash joint venture and argued it keeps Japan at the front of memory manufacturing.
The announcement coincides with fresh maneuvering around Kioxia’s ownership. The Bain Capital consortium that took the company over from Toshiba in 2018 still controls it through a vehicle called BCPE Pangea Cayman 2, which holds 14.19%.
SK hynix, itself a member of that consortium, owns bonds that can convert into nearly all of the vehicle’s voting rights. Kwak Noh-Jung, its CEO, said at the Indiana groundbreaking this week that nothing is fixed on the stake, and described the situation as a careful review of how to co-develop NAND markets for customers and suppliers.
With AI workloads stretching memory supply, the subsidy-backed plan eases the capital burden for both partners as they chase the next wave of flash demand.
