When the American subprime crisis first knocked the dollar off its pedestal last year, boosting the euro to record levels, European chip-maker STMicroelectronics felt the pain. So in some ways, the threat of a truly global downturn has come as something of a relief to STMicro as the currency environment becomes more favorable and allows its restructuring efforts to shine through.

The new QFN package family, referred to as QFNs-se, features a higher number of thin I/O terminal pads as compared to conventional single or dual row QFN or leadframe-based Quad Flat Packages (QFP). The QFNs-se can accommodate three or more rows of terminals in a fine fixed or variable pitch, providing a wider pin count range of 50 to 250 I/O as compared to standard QFN packages which have 4 to 156 I/O. The QFNs-se is also considered to be a cost effective alternative to lower ball count Fine Pitch Ball Grid Array (FBGA) packages.

Shares of Analog Devices Inc. slid Tuesday after the chip maker warned first-quarter earnings will miss Wall Street's expectations by at least 11 cents by share. Goldman Sachs analyst Craig Hettenbach said the company's reluctance to cut jobs in order to bring down expenses has dragged on the stock. But he reiterated a "Buy" rating on shares, focusing on the company's "leadership position in data converters, where revenue increased" 8 percent year-over-year.

Spansion, one of the world's largest makers of flash memory chips, on Monday offered a grim sales outlook for the current quarter, citing a slowdown in demand as customers shut down factories. Spansion also said it is cutting cost of goods sold by about 25 percent and cutting operating expenses.

The global digital camera market may contract next year, the president of industry leader Canon warned, as sluggish economic conditions dampen consumer demand. Canon was aiming to cut $1 billion in costs with a new computer system to be completed by 2010.

Ever since it rejected a buyout offer from Microsoft early this year, Yahoo! has seen its share price head straight down and suffered a huge talent drain. This week's resignation of co-founder Jerry Yang as chief executive had an air of inevitability to it, as did the recent collapse of its search deal with Google.

“We have slowed our hiring, but we're still hiring,” Schmidt said in an interview that will be aired on Bloomberg Television at 9 pm New York time. Google fell $4.99 to $257.44 today in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The shares have lost 63 percent this year.

Samsung Electronics, the world's No. 2 handset maker, said on Monday the 2008 global handset market could fall short of its 9 percent growth forecast and did not exclude the possibility the market could shrink in 2009.

Americans expect to limit credit-card purchases, seek out bargains and stretch spending as recession fears put a damper on their holiday cheer. If the gloomiest predictions come true, that could spell disaster for many more store chains and their employees, and provide insight on how long it may take the economy to recover.

Sony - working only on OLED TVs, not on small OLED displays

The deal, which includes laser diodes as well as LEDs, should help Sharp and Nichia respond to market demand for LED lighting products and Blu-ray Disc recorders.

The symbolism was hard to miss when the award was handed to Chang by Hector Ruiz, a longtime friend and the chairman of Advanced Micro Devices. AMD just became the latest U.S. company to make plans to divest its factories–to a new foundry venture that will compete with TSMC. “I never look at any competition lightly,” Chang said, but predicts problems for the new foundry because suppliers and customers will be far from its main locations.

Leaders of Asia-Pacific nations have closed their annual summit by declaring their belief that the global economic crisis can be overcome by 2010. The 21 leaders meeting in Lima, Peru, said they supported economic stimulus to ward off the threat of recession.

A federal judge in Seattle has ordered Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to testify in a class action lawsuit against Microsoft that alleges the company misled consumers in a marketing campaign for Windows Vista.

Struggling smartphone maker Palm said Friday it is cutting its workforce, a move the company takes as it loses market share to rivals Apple and RIM.