Kioxia and Western Digital Corp are advancing their merger negotiations and finalizing the agreement specifics, according to a Reuters report citing two informed sources. The two companies are currently ranked as the world's second- and fourth-largest makers of NAND memory, according to TrendForce. So if Western Digital brings Kioxia into the fold, the combined company will become the largest supplier of flash memory.
If the two companies reach an agreement, 43% of the new entity will be owned by Kioxia, 37% will be owned by Western Digital, and the remaining 20% will be owned by existing owners, according to the report. It is noteworthy that Toshiba continues to hold a 40.6% stake in Kioxia, so it would still be a significant shareholder of the new entity.
Although Kioxia and Western Digital jointly produce NAND memory, their business strategies are somewhat different. Kioxia is focused on selling memory, whereas Western Digital is focused on selling NAND-based products, including some of the best SSDs available today.
Kioxia commanded a 19.1% NAND memory market share in Q4 2022, whereas Western Digital had a 16.1% market share, according to TrendForce. Samsung, meanwhile, shipped 33.8% of the NAND memory sold in Q4. Therefore, a company that combines Kioxia's and Western Digital's flash businesses would be the world's largest supplier of NAND, ahead of Samsung and SK hynix.
