Toshiba announced that it had started construction on the newly acquired 150,000m² lot adjacent to its Yokkaichi Operations memory production. It will be dedicated only to producing its proprietary BiCS 3D Flash memory - as well as a Memory R&D Center.

Construction will take place in two phases, much like the firm's Fab 5 plant, with Phase One slated to be finished by summer 2018.

In order to meet this target date, Toshiba Corporation has announced that it would invest approximately $1.6 billion in Toshiba Memory Corporation (TMC) all by itsself.

TMC had been in talks with Western Digital-owned SanDisk for a possible joint investment, but apparently the negotiations failed.

The outfit said that the output of 3D NAND at Yokkaichi is intended to increase to "approximately 90 per cent of its capacity in 2018".

The fact that SanDisk has not chosen to involve itself in this partnership is a little bit odd, given that its parent company, Western Digital, has previously pointed out Toshiba as one of its partners.