Japan's Toshiba to buy British nuclear firm: report

Toshiba plans to buy a controlling interest in British nuclear firm NuGeneration in a bid to rekindle its atomic business which has not drawn any new orders since the 2011 Fukushima crisis, a report said Friday.

Japan's leading Nikkei business daily reported that the engineering giant would scoop up a 50 percent stake in the British company as early as this year in a deal worth about 20 billion yen ($200 million).

The acquisition would be made through Toshiba's US nuclear unit Westinghouse Electric, the report said without citing sources.

A Toshiba spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

NuGeneration is owned by France's GDF Suez and Spain's Iberdrola, which each hold a 50 percent stake in the firm.

Toshiba boosted its interest in Westinghouse earlier this year as it eyes atomic opportunities outside disaster-struck Japan.

Rival Hitachi said last year it would buy British power firm Horizon to expand its nuclear business overseas.

The Fukushima disaster saw a quake-sparked tsunami smash into the plant, sending reactors into meltdown and sparking the worst atomic accident in a generation.