Toshiba needs to desperately divest its chip making business. Negotiations with investors led by Bain Capital appear to be chugging alone steadily.

On Wednesday, in a significant development, Toshiba Corp disclosed it has signed a memorandum to accelerate negotiations for selling its memory chip business to a group of investors led by private equity firm, Bain Capital and chipmaker SK Hynix Inc.

In its statement, Toshiba has stated it now aims to sign a contract by late September.

Significantly, the company has kept the doors for other bidders ajar: it has stated that the memorandum does not exclude talks with other bidders.