Quartz
Toshiba’s best invention is a big reason it’s breaking up
In the face of demands from activist shareholders, Toshiba last week announced it would split into three companies, one for infrastructure, one for electronics, and one to house the 40% share it still owns in its former memory chip unit. A report from its Strategic Review Committee, set up by the Japanese conglomerate in June, reviewed options that including taking it private before presenting the break-up proposal as a vision for Toshiba that “looks beyond the confines of past Japanese business practices” and embraces Japan’s efforts to revitalize its economy. Toshiba, whose roots go back to the late 1800s, has been plagued by governance scandals for the better part of a decade and in recent years has become a focus of activist shareholding firms such as Singapore-based hedge fund Effissimo Management and US-based Elliott Management.
