Toshiba sells key business to Sony

Toshiba has just announced that it will sell its image sensor business to Sony for $163 million.

When it comes to the image sensors used in many smartphones today, most people think that they are made by Sony. Because this is the brand that owns the image technology considered to be in the top ten in the world.

In this field, Toshiba is not inferior and has fierce competition with Sony. However, currently, besides HTC One M9, it is difficult to name 5 smartphones equipped with Toshiba image sensors on the market.

Toshiba has recently been exposed for an accounting scandal of up to 1.2 billion USD. The reason for the accounting scandal was that the company was “too ashamed” to announce its actual business results. As a result, the company that produces nuclear reactors, memory chips and home appliances had to adjust down at least 1.2 billion USD in distributed profits over the past 7 years.

An independent investigation found numerous accounting irregularities. For example, Toshiba sold personal computer components to Taiwanese manufacturers at higher prices than it paid to suppliers. This trick allowed the company to hide production costs from competitors and was used to inflate local profits. The real costs were rolled over to subsequent quarters, the investigation team concluded. The scandal affected Toshiba’s stock price.

To revive its resources and implement long-term reforms, Toshiba decided to sell its core business to Sony for $163 million. This business includes semiconductors and NAND flash memory manufacturing in image sensor technology (CMOS).

Toshiba will focus on NAND flash memory.

According to Cnet