History 2005: Tokyo Kohan to Produce Glass Disks in China

Toyo Kohan Co. Ltd. plans to begin next March full production of glass disks in Shenzhen, China, at a rate of 400,000 substrates per month (probably mainly for Hitachi GST), targeting annual sales of ¥1.3 billion.

The Chinese plant, which boasts 184 employees, is a venture, announced last July and capitalized at ¥2 billion, between Shenzhen Kaifa Magnetic Recording (49%), Marubeni (20.4%) and Toyo Kohan (30.6%).

Production will initially involve 2.5-inch platters, and eventually one-inch disks at a later date.

Note that Marubeni is also a partner of Kobe Steel, which makes aluminum disks, and that Toyo Kohan is currently making Ni-P disk substrates in Kedah, Malaysia in a plant owned 60% by Toyo Kohan and 40% by Marubeni.

Meanwhile, Shenzhen Kaifa Magnetic Recording is part of the enormous Chinese group Great Wall group, one subsidiary of which is ExcelStor Technology, an assembler of desktop HDDs for Hitachi GST as well as for itself, which intends to venture into 2.5-inch HDDs at the end of the year, and thus will need glass disks to this end.

This article is an abstract of news published on issue 205 on January 2005 from the former paper version of Computer Data Storage Newsletter.