Hitachi last year sat out a bruising price war in the flat-panel television industry. This year it's back with a vengeance with a new line of energy-sipping LED, or light-emitting diode, LCD televisions.

China-based BOE Technology has adopted SpringSoft's Laker Custom Layout Automation System as its standard custom chip design platform. SpringSoft said the long-time panel customer is expanding deployment of the Laker software from early 4.5G, 5G and 6G FPD product applications to its latest 8.5G offerings and institutes for advanced technology development.

Samsung Electronics, Asia's biggest maker of semiconductors, flat screens and mobile phones, reported profit that missed analysts' estimates, fueling concern the global recovery in demand for electronics is stalling.

Toshiba plans to scrap plans to mass-produce OLED panels at its unit Toshiba Mobile Display and focus on high-demand LCD panels instead.

China-based Sichuan Changhong Electric has committed to fulfilling purchasing target plans for Fairchild's power and mobile components through December 2015. Fairchild's devices are designed into a broad range of Changhong products including LED TVs, PDP TVs, LCD TVs, CRT TVs, set-top boxes, refrigerators and air conditioners.

The Taiwan-based Industrial Technology Research Institute, or ITRI, won the top prize in this year's Innovation Awards contest for a manufacturing technique that promises to clear the way for commercial development of high-quality displays on flexible materials.

Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Kun-hee has signaled that the company's component businesses have reached a peak, suggesting that profit may fall in 2011 from this year's record level.