Headlines about Toshiba’s financial challenges have again surfaced, the latest being this week’s news of Toshiba Corp. taking a $6.3 billion write down of their nuclear business. While it’s interesting news on a global scale, the impact on the office equipment group seems to be minimal, if non existent.

Here’s why. Toshiba America Business Solutions (TABS) is part of a bigger company – Toshiba Tec. Toshiba Tech is part of the Toshiba Corp family but is a standalone company on its own, independently traded on the Tokyo stock exchange with it’s own trading symbol (TSHTY). It’s its own entity. If Toshiba Corp went away overnight, Toshiba Tec would still be here tomorrow.

Blanket headlines about Toshiba selling off assets and taking massive write downs don’t necessarily affect the local groups you all work with or compete against.

In fact, since the latest stories broke about the $6.3B write down Toshiba Corp is undertaking, Toshiba Tec’s stock was up 17% at the time this was written, according to Toshiba America President and CEO Scott Maccabe.

From what I’m looking at, Toshiba Tec’s stock may have increased in that time from $15.60 (Dec. 28) to $22.79 (Feb. 16), an increase of 46%. Market cap has increased in that period from $0.84 Billion to $1.57 Billion – almost doubling the value of the company in the span of less than two months.

I’m not a financial person and there’s a reason my family calls it “Andy Math,” but to me it looks like Toshiba Tec (parent company to Toshiba America Business Solutions) became a whole lot stronger and more financially stable over the last several weeks.

Here’s the letter Scott sent out to the channel addressing this latest financial situation:

Dear Valued Customers, Partners & Employees,

On February 14, 2017, Toshiba Corporation announced that it expects to record a $6.3 billion dollar write down on the value of its US nuclear unit. Due to the complexity of the ongoing discovery process, the company has delayed the release of its audited financial statements until March 14th.

Among the counter measures that the company is exploring is the sale of shares in its flash memory operations.

Your business partner, Toshiba America Business Solutions, Inc. (TABS), while a member of the Toshiba group of companies, is independent both financially and operationally from Toshiba Corporation. As such, the current issues surrounding Toshiba Corporation do not directly affect our ability to service our clients, invest in research and development or operate our business in the world-class manner to which you are accustomed.

TABS is owned in the majority by Toshiba Tec Corporation, an independently operated corporation.

Although Toshiba Corporation is its majority shareholder, Toshiba Tec is publicly traded on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. In fact, since the first announcement of the issues surrounding the nuclear business on December 27th, the value of Toshiba Tec shares has increased by 17% through February 14th.

While we understand that the stream of news surrounding Toshiba Corporation may cause concern, please be assured that TABS is strongly committed to remaining a leading provider of multifunction printers, managed document services and digital signage. We remain strong financially and operationally and are dedicated to continuing our award-winning levels of customer support.

Thank you for your continued support of Toshiba America Business Solutions, Inc.

Sincerely,

 

 

Scott Maccabe

President and CEO

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