Intel continues to make a push back into the cell-phone chip business - "sometimes under the radar" - as it acquired Comsys Mobile Communication and Signal Processing for US$30 million in late May, according to Forward Concepts.

Thin-film solar cells are optimal for use in a high-temperature climate, compared to crystalline solar cells. Sharp's experience in the mass production of thin-film solar cells has enabled Sharp to take part in this project. The thin-film solar cell modules to be used in the power generation plant will be supplied partially from Sharp's solar cell plant at Osaka Prefecture.

Citing "adverse market conditions," MagnaChip Semiconductor said it will not move forward with its planned initial public offering now.

Kingston Digital, the flash memory affiliate of Kingston Technology, will partner with security company BlockMaster to provide greater availability of centrally managed USB drives.

Micron Technology's shares slumped more than 13% on concerns about the growth rates for DRAM chips. However, some of the analysts who follow Micron seemed unfazed by the potential negativity, saying that such comments may actually end up benefiting Micron.

Atmel has agreed to sell its smart card business to Inside Contactless for US$37 million in cash and up to $21 million more if targets are met. The transaction is expected to close by the end of the third quarter of 2010, subject to certain closing conditions.

Infineon has denied it is in discussions with diversified Russian holding company AFK Sistema, according to a report, in a rerun of denials from September 2009 and earlier.

Prices of DRAM fell for the first time in over a year in June, as companies increased production and PC vendors toughened their stance on further price increases. Analysts now say prices will slide for the rest of the year.

French nuclear giant Areva, hinted last week during a meeting in Forbes offices that Areva is developing a hybrid solar power plant concept that combines a solar thermal system with solar photovoltaic (PV) panels.

Tesla will be the first automaker to go public since the Ford Motor Company held its initial public offering in 1956. It expects the stock sale to raise up to $185 million, The Associated Press reports.

Hyundai Heavy Industries said it doubles its annual solar module and solar cell production capacity from current 320MW and 370MW to 600MW respectively by early 2011.

The Goldman Sachs Global Clean Energy team bases its installation forecast on supply forecast of 20GW and 28GW in 2010 and 2011 respectively.

Freescale Semiconductor has introduced its Xtrinsic sensing solutions, which are designed with the combination of high-performance sensing capability, processing capacity and customizable software to help deliver differentiated sensing applications.

Enabling "hot" electrons to carry that wasted energy could be a step towards solar cells with double the efficiency of current technology. Solar cells could see a boost in their theoretical maximum efficiency from 31% to 66%, thanks to a novel way of harnessing electrons whose energy is normally lost as heat.

IBM, Samsung and Globalfoundries are working with STMicroelectronics to develop and standardize advanced, 28nm process technology to ensure consistent production worldwide for electronics and device manufacturers.

"We are targeting segments within the semiconductor market that are growing faster," said Infineon CEO Peter Bauer. "The wireless market is bigger than before the crisis, driven by smartphones and emerging market phones."

Germany's LFoundry, an analog and mixed-signal foundry, has completed its previously-announced acquisition of Atmel's wafer fabrication operation in Rousset, France.

Toshiba plans to expand manufacturing capacity at its plant in Houston, Texas for production of high-performance drive motors for hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and electric vehicles (EVs).

Thirty-three states, including California, have reached a US$173 million settlement with six DRAM makers alleged to have fixed prices for their products between 1998 and 2002. The companies named in the lawsuit are Micron Technology and NEC Electronics America as well as Infineon Technologies, Hynix Semiconductor, Elpida Memory and Mosel Vitelic.

China has started a massive open tender of utility-scale solar power projects after a smaller tender last year, in an effort, analysts said, to help Beijing set on-grid power prices for such projects.

SunPower announced Wednesday that it produced a full-scale solar cell with a sunlight-to-electricity conversion efficiency rate of 24.2%, a new world record.

Broadcom expects to close the acquisition of Innovision Research & Technology, which specializes in near-field communication (NFC) technology, in the third quarter of 2010.

GTronix' proprietary technology provides very low power solutions for noise cancellation in mobile applications such as wireless handsets and audio accessories, National Semi said in a statement. The analog chipmaker has acquired GTronix for an undisclosed sum.

ASIF chairman Javier Anta said the government proposed limiting the hours of output for which a solar plant could receive subsidies, instead of cutting the subsidies for plants themselves.

The race is now on between Italy, Czech Republic, United States, and potentially even Japan, to become just the third country member of the elite club to install 1GW of PV in a single year.

Chinese wafer supplier Huantai Silicon has suspended its partnership with the country's solar cells and panels giant Suntech Power on their joint venture Glory Silicon, and will jointly build a new venture with U.S. veteran wafer producer MEMC Electronic Materials.

Scientists in the US claim to have extended the operating life of plastic solar cells from mere hours to eight months.

STMicroelectronics said it plans to hire more workers to expand one of its two plants in China, defying higher operating costs as the government orders companies to increase employee pay.

The solution features Altera's low-cost Cyclone III or Cyclone IV FPGAs, and IP from Eyelytics and Apical supporting AltaSens' 1080p60 A3372E3-4T and Aptina's 720p60 MT9M033 HD wide dynamic range (WDR) CMOS image sensors.

Spansion stayed in Chapter 11 four plus months longer and lost more market share than planned. On the positive side, business is up for Spansion and its rivals.

MagnaChip Semiconductor, which filed for bankruptcy protection in June 2009, has priced an initial public offering (IPO) of stock to raise about US$130 million. This is about half the amount it had originally said it planned to raise.

There's plenty of sun to go around. Our local star is continuously transmitting 180 quadrillion watts of energy to the Earth, 14,000 times our requirements for generating power. So the question isn't where to get our energy, but how to capture it.

An investment unit of electric utility PG&E Corp. will invest $100 million in rooftop solar systems for 3,500 new homes nationwide, the company said Monday.

Spansion has received authorization to list its common stock on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). The company anticipates that trading will begin on or about June 23, 2010.

The company said it will incur restructuring charges of about US$5 million in its fiscal second quarter, and the staff reduction was one of several cost-cutting actions.

STMicroelectronics is to provide the University with digital multimedia and advanced analog chips, expert support and advanced design tools, and jointly cooperate on applications engineering projects assigned by ST to the University. ST will also donate one million yuan (US$147,100) to the Graduate School each year for five years.

Following its recent move to TSMC's high-performance, low-power (HPL) process technology at 28nm, Xilinx is aggressively broadening the reach of programmable logic into the traditional ASSP and ASIC markets with three new FPGA families on its roadmap, the low-cost low-power Artix-7, the Kintex-7, and the high-end Virtex-7 due to be sampling in the first quarter of2011.