Computer History Museum

Saito, Shozo oral history

Mr. Saito was born in Gifu Prefecture in 1950. He later moved to Tokyo where he attended Waseda University, studying applied physics. After debating between going on for a PhD, or going to work, he decided to join an R&D group at Toshiba. His first project at Toshiba (during the mid-1970s) involved the development of non-volatile semiconductor memories, using MNOS technology. Toshiba then decided to move more resources into their DRAM development, so Saito-san transferred to this new laboratory and began working on the 64K and 256K DRAMs. Toshiba was late to market, so Saito-san was asked to develop a CMOS 1Mbit DRAM to compete against nMOS DRAMs from other vendors. The product he developed turned out to be an industry leader, with high speed and low power. Toshiba later moved from DRAM to NAND flash and Saito made the same move. He held top engineering positions in this new area. In 2004, he became the Vice President of the Memory Division. Besides his own work, Saito-san also discussed Toshiba’s changing focus over the years, including moves into nuclear energy, and life sciences.

Item Details

Date
2016-06-23 (Made)
Type
Moving Image
Catalogue number
102738184
Organization
Computer History Museum (Publisher)
People
Shozo Saito (Interviewee)
Doug Fairbairn (Interviewer)
Category
Oral History
Format
MOV
Credit line
Computer History Museum
Place of publication
Asia/Japan/Tokyo
Language
English
Acquisition number
X7575.2016
Subject
Toshiba Corporation, Flash, NAND, DRAM, MNOS, Non-Volatile Memory
Archive collection
CHM Oral History Collection
Archive hierarchy
Oral History collection