Apple and Bain Capital make a bid on Toshiba NAND unit

The battle for Toshiba's prized NAND flash memory division is still raging. Last week we wrote Western Digital ended up in pole position after an earlier deal fell through because of legal concerns over WD's letigation against Toshiba. A new report from Bloomberg indicates Bain Capital is now teaming up with Apple to submit a new bid.

Bain Capital had previously submitted a 2.1 trillion yen ($19 billion) offer, whereas the Western Digital-led consortium is now offering about 2.0 trillion yen. It's not clear how Apple would support the new Bain Capital bid but analysts point out Apple is always looking to work closely with its key suppliers and lock in long-term supply deals.

Bloomberg suggests Apple may provide capital by pre-paying for future NAND flash memory deliveries, which is something it has done before to bailout suppliers:

It’s not clear exactly how Apple would support Bain’s bid. Rather than take an equity stake, the U.S. company may provide money by pre-paying for chip supplies in the future, a standard practice in the industry that Apple has used in the past to give suppliers financial support. That would be simpler in some ways for Apple and allow it to avoid hurting relationships with other suppliers, like Samsung and SK Hynix Inc.

Toshiba failed to meet its self-imposed deadline of reaching a deal by Thursday. The Japanese conglomerate says it's currently in talks with three bidding parties.