TOKYO (Reuters) – Japanese conglomerate Toshiba said on Monday it was considering a split into two independent companies, instead of the three originally planned.
Toshiba now wants to combine its electronic device and data storage activities with its memory chip division into a single entity.
The conglomerate previously wanted to combine its energy and infrastructure activities in a single entity, activities related to electronic devices and data storage in another, while a third company would have managed the memory chip activity.
Toshiba also plans to increase the return to shareholders to 300 billion yen (about 2.3 billion euros) over the next two years, while it previously targeted a return of 100 billion yen.
This split into two independent companies would reduce costs compared to a split into three entities, but some investors suspect that this new plan is designed to allow Toshiba to avoid a shareholder vote, which should have been supported by at least two-thirds of them.
(Report Makiko Yamazaki, written by David Dolan; French version Camille Raynaud)
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