Toshiba is expected to start mass-producing its "BiCS (bit-cost scalable)" 3D NAND flash memory next year. Speaking at at a press meeting that took place Aug 7, 2013, in Tokyo, Hisao Tanaka, president and CEO of Toshiba Corp. said, "We have not yet clearly decided when to start volume production, but we are planning to start it at the end of this fiscal year (fiscal 2013 ending in March 2014) or the beginning of the next fiscal year (fiscal 2014)," Japanese Tech-On web site reported.

"We will realize a chip size (area) that can never be surpassed by our competitors. Please do not consider that Toshiba is half a year behind Samsung in terms of volume production, " he added.

Toshiba is confident that it will be able to effectively compete with Samsung in the development race for NAND flash memories, including 3D NAND. The copmpany plans to introduce 1Ynm and 1Znm process technologies before the release of the BiCS.

Toshiba's second generation of its 19nm technology is currently used for volume production. The company will soon be able to introduce a new process technology that is one generation more advanced.