Toshiba today announced that it intends to strengthen its international R&D organization and increase the number of R&D personnel at its facilities outside Japan by 750 people by the end of fiscal year 2014.

Toshiba says the new personnel will mainly engage in software development for social infrastructure and product development for emerging economies. The new hires will account for about 70% of Toshiba's increased R&D headcount in the period to FY2014.

In its mid-term business plan of strategies and goals for the period to the end of FY 2014, Toshiba gives central place to promoting total storage innovation - businesses related to Big Data and cloud solutions and services-and total energy innovation - businesses related to power supply and the realization of the Smart Community concept. Toshiba is channeling resources to reinforcing its capabilities in both business areas, including R&D.

The Japanese company expects to see some 400 additional R&D personnel in its facilities outside of Japan, including those in India, supporting accelerated development of infrastructure for cloud-based platforms and other areas related to storage innovation by FY2014. The company plans investments in R&D expenditure totaling 1,080 billion yen in the period FY2012 to TF2014 and expect to channel some 60% to this area.

The number of R&D personnel working outside Japan to support energy innovation is expected to grow by about 300 people by the end of FY2014. As it increases the headcount, Toshiba will also promote closer cooperation with the R&D divisions of Westinghouse and Landis+Gyr, toward establishing a global R&D system.

The number of researchers engaged in basic research will also be increased, by approximately 50.

In parallel with these moves, Toshiba will also reinforce its intellectual property strategy by increasing the ratio of overseas patent applications from the current 50% of all applications to 70% in FY2014. This will enhance IP security at the global level and support the company in seeking to raise income by licensing IP by 1.3 times.

Toshiba also said it was developing a line of data centers based on its flash memory chips.

"Storage systems based on Toshiba's capabilities in NAND flash memory, HDD and SSD will provide secure solutions for the age of Big Data, including data centers and cloud-based platforms supporting new services and solutions for healthcare, the retail sector and other areas," Toshiba said

Chips smaller than the already released 19 nm versions (memory) are expected to be developed by Toshiba in the next two years. The company is also working on three-dimensional storage, a possible successor to current NAND flash technology that stacks memory in layers for greater density, and says it will have prototype samples ready by 2013.