Sharp will spend 15 billion yen to add a new assembly line for mass-producing highly efficient solar cells at its Sakai plant this fiscal year. The line will be able to churn out the equivalent of 200,000kw a year, driving up Sharp's total annual solar cell output capacity more than 20% to 1.07 million kilowatts.

Nokia has said it will stick with Symbian as its main business-phone platform even when MeeGo, the handset-maker's new top-end operating system, is released.

Nokia and HTC said they persuaded a court to void parts of a mobile phone patent that IP holding company IPCom GmbH claimed the two device makers infringed.

According to a Nokia Siemens Networks blog post on Tuesday, iOS 4.2 - released on 22 November - introduced support for Network Controlled Fast Dormancy, which Nokia Siemens has implemented on the network side and Nokia started building into its smartphones earlier this year.

It should come as no surprise that Apple and Android are the two "most desired" smartphone systems, according to a new Nielsen survey of mobile phone users. But the results vary a bit based on the people who were surveyed.

Following the acquisition of Numonyx earlier this year, Micron Technology has reorganized its memory operations. The company has also recruited Tom Eby, a former executive vice president and chief marketing and sales officer at NOR rival Spansion.

Sony, Nikon and SanDisk have developed a new specification for CompactFlash memory cards that promises photographers the ability to continuously shoot high-quality RAW images. The proposed new format supports data transmission at up to 500MBps, according to their joint statement.

The U.S. Federal Reserve on Wednesday disclosed details of loans made to financial firms, companies and foreign central banks during the financial crisis. Fed officials said it is the biggest release of crisis lending data that a central bank has ever done.

IBM seems to be shifting away from semiconductor manufacturing, and planning to rely on Samsung and GlobalFoundries as foundry suppliers. Both foundries are set to have wafer fabs for foundry operations in the US, which could help cement relations.

Tesla has incorporated Infineon's power semiconductors in its battery-powered Roadster, and is also testing them for its Model S, which is scheduled to begin production in 2012, according to Infineon spokesperson Christian Hoenicke.

STATS ChipPAC announced it has shipped over 100 million semiconductor packages with copper wire bond interconnect, and expects copper wire bond production volume to grow another 75% by the end of 2010 due to a rapidly growing customer base.

Motorola announced that its split into two separate companies will become effective Jan 4, when the company will change its name to Motorola Solutions. The handset division will be called Motorola Mobility Holdings.

Nokia Siemens Networks revealed Tuesday that the company had conducted tests confirming that the iOS 4.2 update for iPhone supports its Network Controlled Fast Dormancy technology, which minimizes network congestion and improves battery life.

Altera, which along with competitor Xilinx dominates the programmable logic chips market, said it was increasing its 2011 R&D budget by 26% to US$330 million as it introduces a new generation of chips. It will ship a 28nm microchip in the first quarter, and announce more 28nm chip families during 2011.

Device fingerprinting, or collecting digital identifiers from computers, cellphones and TV set-top boxes, is emerging as the latest tool for companies who sell the information to advertisers willing to pay for granular data about people's interests and activities.

For 2011, the fab tool growth will be driven by foundry and NAND to offset a "pause in DRAM" ...

Applied Materials and Samsung Electronics have reached a settlement agreement that resolves potential civil claims and removes the risk of civil litigation between the parties relating to the alleged acquisition, misappropriation and misuse of Samsung's confidential semiconductor information in Korea.

Taiwan's dollar and stocks advanced as the island's ruling party won key local elections, prompting speculation President Ma Ying-jeou will extend pro- China policies that boosted investment.

More Americans went shopping over the Thanksgiving weekend than in recent memory, and online shopping accounted for the highest percentage of the weekend's sales yet.

The smartphone industry has designated which smartphone OS best fits each usergroup to help vendors sell phones and consumers buy the one that's right for them.