Kioxia Becomes Japan's Most Valuable Listed Company on AI Memory Demand

Kioxia became Japan's most valuable listed company amid surging demand for memory chips used in artificial intelligence applications. Business Insider reported that the company's shares have climbed more than 4,000 percent since its December 2024 listing. On Thursday, Kioxia shares closed 8.3 percent higher.

The Nikkei 225 index gained 1.4 percent the same day, while South Korea's Kospi rose 0.6 percent. Samsung Electronics added 0.2 percent and SK Hynix rose 5.3 percent ahead of its Nasdaq debut on Friday. Yuji Sugimoto, who led Bain Capital's acquisition of Toshiba Memory, said the company's turnaround would not have been possible under Toshiba ownership.

"It would have been impossible to keep making massive investments while also posting huge losses. Other divisions in the company would have opposed it," he told Nikkei. Toshiba Memory was spun off from Toshiba in 2017 and acquired by a Bain-led consortium for about 2 trillion yen in 2018.

The company was renamed Kioxia in 2019. Bain Capital has since exited its investment, Managing Partner David Gross told Bloomberg Television on Thursday. Sugimoto attributed the success of South Korean chipmakers to their ownership structures.

"The reason South Korean companies are so successful in the semiconductor industry is the powerful top-down leadership and ownership structures of the chaebol conglomerates like Samsung and SK," he said.