Sharp cut its annual profit forecast by 40%, citing the stronger yen and falling prices of panels. Net income will probably total 30 billion yen (US$367 million) in the year to March 2011, down from its previous forecast of 50 billion yen.

The purported function of an ambient light sensor is to detect the amount of ambient light intersecting with the display's screen, and then either increase or decrease the display's brightness. If there's too much ambient light, the sensor adjusts the brightness upwards, and in a minimal ambient light situation, the brightness is decreased appropriately.

There may be 14 foreign firms approved to set up R&D centers in Taiwan this year, including those to be publicized by Elpida and Corning soon, according to the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA).

But shares of Veeco, which makes precision manufacturing equipment for the LED and data storage markets, slipped after hours as the company predicted some revenue slated for the fourth quarter may not come in until early next year.

"New Product sales were led by particularly strong growth from the Virtex-6 and Spartan-6 FPGA families," said Moshe Gavrielov, Xilinx President and CEO. "Combined sales from these families more than doubled sequentially in the September quarter..."

Toshiba's operating profits for the April-September period is set to come to more than 100 billion yen (US$1.2 billion), beating the company's forecast of 70 billion yen, according to the Nikkei business daily. Booming global sales of smartphones have boosted demand for the company's flash memory chips and small LCD panels.

"This month, for the first time ever, Android revenue exceeded iPhone-only revenue amidst strong raw iOS impression growth," according to Millenial's Oct 19 report.