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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Western Digital has apparently been spurned as Toshiba has agreed to sell its semiconductor business to Bain Capital instead [reuters.com] for around $18 billion. The deal has not been finalized so more confusion could be over the horizon:

Japan's Toshiba Corp agreed on Wednesday to sell its prized semiconductor business to a group led by U.S. private equity firm Bain Capital LP, a key step in keeping the struggling Japanese conglomerate listed on the Tokyo exchange. In a last-minute twist to a long and highly contentious auction, Toshiba said in a late-night announcement through the exchange it agreed to sign a contract for the deal worth about 2 trillion yen (13.22 billion pounds).

The decision to sell the world's No. 2 producer of NAND memory chips, first reported by Reuters, was made at a board meeting earlier on Wednesday. Late on Tuesday, sources had said Toshiba was leaning towards selling the business to its U.S. joint venture partner Western Digital Corp. It's unclear whether the sale to the Bain Capital-led group will proceed smoothly, as Western Digital has previously initiated legal action against Toshiba, arguing that no deal can be done without its consent due to its position as Toshiba's joint venture chip partner.

Also at NYT [nytimes.com], Engadget [engadget.com], Nasdaq [nasdaq.com], BBC [bbc.com], and Bloomberg [bloomberg.com] (alt opinion [bloomberg.com]).

Previously: Chaos as Toshiba Tries to Sell Memory Business [soylentnews.org]

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