Taiwan's China-friendly ruling party lost a slew of traditional strongholds in local elections on Saturday, triggering the resignation of the island's premier and the cabinet.

South Korea's Samsung Electronics has secured a licence to invest US$3 billion to expand its production in northern Vietnam, the Vietnamese government said.

Qualcomm said it is holding "difficult discussions" with Chinese authorities as the world's largest maker of mobile-phone chips tries to resolve an investigation that's hurting the collection of licensing revenue.

Trade negotiators from China and the US have reached a preliminary deal they say could end tariffs on as much as a trillion dollars in annual global sales of high-tech goods, eliminating tariffs as high as 25% on some next-generation semiconductors. The deal requires approval of the World Trade Organization, which could take up the issue as early as December.

The iPhone 6 will be sold in China from Oct 17, after rigorous regulator scrutiny led to Apple reassuring the Chinese government that the smartphones did not have security "backdoors" through which US agencies can access users' data.

Qualcomm is under investigation in China for allegedly overcharging and exploiting its market position, which will see the US chipmaker facing fines of over US$1 billion.

South Korean multinational conglomerates Samsung and LG are considering setting up units to manufacture electronic chips in India, following the government's clearance to build two such semiconductor units.

Samsung recently won an order for roughly 7,000 smartphones from the US Army and is close to an order for several thousand devices from the US National Security Agency, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Wang Yu-chi and Zhang Zhijun, the top cross-strait officials from each side, are both attending the four-day talks in Nanjing.

Qualcomm may be hit with a record fine exceeding US$1 billion in a Chinese antitrust probe, raising the specter of harsh penalties for foreign firms facing an increasingly aggressive regulator.

China and Taiwan officials set a date for talks next month, the United Daily News reported today, paving the way for the first official government-to-government meetings since a civil war six decades ago.

China's Commerce Ministry has condemned a $1.1 trillion spending bill passed by the United States Congress last week over clauses that limit technological purchases from China, saying the limits clash with the principles of fair trade.

US-listed chipmaker RDA Microelectronics said it received an US$18 per share buyout offer from China's state-owned Tsinghua Unigroup, which is funded by the Tsinghua University, marking it a second such bid in more than a month.

The US government has begun a partial shutdown after the two houses of Congress failed to agree a new budget.

Two consortiums, including IBM and STMicroelectronics, have proposed building semiconductor wafer plants in India costing a total of $8 billion, a minister said after the government approved concessions to lure chipmakers.

"Android's persistent fragmentation problem isn't just a Google problem, but a federal government concern too."

A Taiwan government venture capital fund will sell more than 170 million shares in TSMC in 2014 to help fund Taiwan's budget, a source with direct knowledge of the sale said on Thursday.

The deal would be a boost for Samsung, which is increasingly seeking to cater to the needs of government agencies, a niche long dominated by Canadian smartphone maker BlackBerry.

Huawei has denied claims made by a former US Central 簫Intelligence Agency (CIA) chief, Michael Hayden, that it has spied for the Chinese government.

Google filed a court petition Tuesday demanding it be allowed to share information about government surveillance programs with the public.

This is the second major project driven by the government of Taiwan that relies on security chips from Infineon: more than 25 million pieces have already been shipped for the electronic health cards of the Taiwan Health Care Project.

China resolutely opposes plans by the EU to impose punitive tariffs on imported China-made solar panels and will protect local companies, a spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce said on May 9.

An investigation is under way after two explosions near the finishing line of the Boston Marathon left three people dead and at least 140 injured.

The Japan government has approved a cut to the FIT for solar by 10%. The cut would see the tariff paid be reduced to JPY37.8/kWh (US$0.40/kWh) from the current rate of JPY42/kWh (US$0.45/kWh), as of April 1.

Former solar billionaire and Australian citizen Shi Zhengrong is being investigated by China authorities over financial dealings that may have contributed to the insolvency of the company he founded, Suntech Power.

Computer networks running three major South Korean banks and the country's two largest broadcasters were paralyzed Wednesday in attacks that some experts suspected originated in North Korea, which has consistently threatened to cripple its far richer neighbor.

Suntech Power Holdings has appointed Weiping Zhou, former chairman of Guolian Futures and finance department manager of government-owned investment company Wuxi Guolian Development, executive director and company president.

China, forecast to become the largest solar-power market this year, may abolish subsidy programs for some of its largest projects and target the money instead to smaller ones, an industry official said.

Xi Jinping was named China's president Thursday by the country's parliament, one of the final steps in China's once-in-a-decade leadership change.

The China Academy of Telecommunication Research, a think tank linked to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, has said that China is too reliant on Google's mobile operating system and accused the company of using its dominance to discriminate against China-based firms.

Taiwan's top economic official resigned Friday as popular support for the government has plunged, though the island appears to be rebounding from an economic slowdown.

The dollar jumped to a two-year high against the yen Thursday on expectations that Japan's new government will lower interest rates to boost the economy, weakening the yen.

An investment fund controlled by Japan's government has agreed to rescue Renesas Electronics by buying a majority stake in the lossmaking chipmaker for about JPY180 billion (US$2.2 billion), people familiar with the deal said.

Japan's prime minister dissolved the lower house of parliament Friday to avoid a disastrous freeze in government spending, triggering elections that could result in more aggressive policies to stimulate the country's economy.

On 14 November, people in Madrid and all across Europe participated in a demonstration against government austerity measures.

The Australian government said it will phase out a solar incentive program in January, six months earlier than scheduled, to cut electricity bills for homes and businesses next year by as much as AUD100 million (US$103 million).