Artifact Details

Title

Saito, Shozo oral history

Catalog Number

102738185

Type

Document

Description

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.

Date

2016-06-23

Contributor

Fairbairn, Doug, interviewer

Saito, Shozo, interviewee

Publisher

Computer History Museum

Place of Publication

Tokyo, Japan

Extent

24 p.

Format

PDF

Subject

Toshiba Corporation; MNOS; non-volatile memory; DRAM; GSA; IIC; NAND; Flash

Credit