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China: MOFCOM starts Toshiba merger review

By  |  December 17, 2017

Chinese regulators have opened an antitrust investigation into Toshiba Corp’s US$18 billion deal to sell its memory chip unit to a consortium led by Bain Capital LP that includes South Korean memory maker SK Hynix in a passive role, possibly delaying the March closing date that Toshiba’s leaders have targeted, the Nikkei Asian Review newspaper reported on Friday, December 15.

China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) started their review earlier in December, despite the fact that Toshiba had applied for it in September, when it reached a deal with Bain and its partners, the newspaper said.

Merger reviews in China typically take about four months but sometimes stretch to six, making it unclear whether Toshiba can hit its March 2018 target for closing the deal, the paper said.

The deal has already secured regulatory approval in the United States and Japan, but still needs approval in China, Taiwan and South Korea.

Full Content: Deal Street Asia

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