On July 13, 2011, Solar Frontier K.K. (Tokyo, Japan) announced that it has begun shipping 150 watt copper indium selenium (CIS) solar photovoltaic (PV) modules from its Kunitomi Plant in Japan.

Toshiba and SanDisk on July 12 celebrated the opening of Fab 5, the third 300mm wafer NAND fabrication facility at Toshiba's Yokkaichi Operations in Mie Prefecture, Japan.

Four months ago Japan's huge earthquake and tsunami wreaked havoc with Japanese equities, causing such frenzied selling that the Tokyo Stock Exchange came under pressure to shut the bourse temporarily. The Nikkei 225 index is now rebounding and homing in on its March 11 close of 10,254.43, when traders had just 14 minutes to react to the quake before trading ended.

Trading company giant Mitsui & Co. plans to build huge solar power plants in the Tohoku region to help the region recover from the March 11 disaster by easing its power shortages, it was learned Wednesday.

The president of the Japanese electronics maker Sharp Corp. said Monday it will localize more of its solar panel production outside the country, as the strong yen makes exports too expensive while fast-growing Chinese makers create a global inventory glut.

Having 8 facilities within the Tokyo Electric Power Company and Tohoku Electric Power Co service areas, Kyocera has increased the size of the rooftop solar power system at its Tanagura manufacturing plant in Fukushima Prefecture, to meet energy reduction targets of 15%, due to the power consumption regulations dictated after the Fukushima nuclear power disaster.

Analysts say the Pacific discovery could challenge China's dominance, if recovering the minerals from the seabed proves commercially viable. At present, China produces 97% of the world's rare earth metals.

Japan's Ricoh plans to acquire Pentax as part of a push to get into the digital single-lens reflex camera market, it said Friday.

"It is a bit surprising that we have not seen a more significant impact on our global IT spending forecast as a results of the Japan earthquake and tsunami, but despite widespread concerns about disruptions to the supply of critical components in the initial aftermath of the natural disaster, there has not been a dramatic impact on overall IT spending," said Richard Gordon, research VP at Gartner.

TI's Miho and Aizu sites and its Tokyo offices were affected by the initial magnitude 8.9 earthquake. Initial production lines at Miho resumed in mid-April, and full production will resume in third quarter. TI's fab in Aizu has returned to full production.

Hitachi Ltd is in talks with Toshiba and Sony about joining the merger of their liquid-crystal display (LCD) units, a move that would create the world's largest maker of small panels, two sources with knowledge of the matter said on Thursday.

3M has announced the opening of the company's application laboratory in Yangmei, Taiwan, for 200mm and 300mm temporary wafer bonding. The addition expands 3M's existing wafer support applications labs in Japan and the US to meet customer demand.

Solar is one of the power sources the government of the world's third-largest economy is focusing on after the March earthquake and tsunami shattered Tokyo's nuclear-dependent energy policy.

Solar panel maker Suntech Power Holdings Co. expects to double its market share in Japan to at least 10 percent in 2012, helped by the expected adoption of a feed-in-tariff scheme, the head of its Japan business said on Tuesday.

Factory output rose by 1% in April from the previous month as companies worked towards dealing with problems in supply chain disruption.

A warning from a government trade council in Taiwan highlights concerns that the island has become increasingly isolated by the burgeoning network of free trade agreements connecting Asia and the rest of the world.

Sequans Communications has shipped its ten millionth 4G chip. Today, Sequans' chips are inside leading 4G devices, such as the HTC EVO 4G smartphone launched by Sprint in USA and the HTC EVO WiMAX smartphone launched by KDDI in Japan.

The economy shrank by a much worse-than-expected annualised 3.7% in the first three months of 2011, marking the second consecutive quarter of contraction, which economists define as a technical recession.

The consumer confidence index fell to 33.1 in April 2011, down from 38.6 in March, according to the Cabinet Office. A reading below 50 suggests consumer pessimism.

Mosaid Technologies has commenced patent infringement litigation against Elpida Memory of Japan. Two other companies, Buffalo and Axiontech, are also named as defendants in the suit.

The operator of Japan's crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has asked the government for help compensating victims of the crisis.

Toshiba has said it returned to the black for the year to March 2011, but warned the outlook remains uncertain due to the impact of the massive quake and tsunami in Japan.

Amkor's rise in revenues wasn't enough to offset an increase in expenses, and would have been higher had the company not taken a hit from the Japan disaster. Amkor operates a 211,000-square foot factory in Japan, one of the company's smallest facilities, according to regulatory filings.

Japan's parliament has passed a JPY4 trillion (US$49 billion) emergency budget for reconstruction following the 11 March earthquake and tsunami.

Sony plans to resume production of Blu-ray and other optical discs at a tsunami-hit factory in northern Japan in late May, according to the company.

Panasonic plans to cut 40,000 jobs globally over the next two years, the Kyodo news agency and the Nikkei business daily reported. The job losses represent about 10% of the company's workforce, and most of the cuts will come from the company's overseas divisions.

Video games giant Nintendo has seen its annual profits slump by 66%, hurt by a strong yen and a drop in sales.

Renesas Electronics expects to restart production at a quake-hit factory in east Japan in mid June, about two weeks earlier than initially planned.

Qualcomm reported record quarterly revenues and raised its guidance for 2011 as global demand for smartphones and tablets grew. Supply-chain concerns stemming from the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster in Japan had not affected Qualcomm's ability to make chips, and it had seen very little impact on demand for its products, the company said.

GDP will expand 0.8% in 2011, down sharply from the 1.7% growth previously forecast. But as reconstruction spending gains pace, the economy will expand 2.3% in 2012, faster than previous estimates for 1.3% growth, the OECD said.

The driving force of Japan's economy has gone into reverse. In March exports fell 2.2% which is the first drop in almost a year and a half.

The event was postponed due to the ongoing recovery efforts in the wake of the Great East Japan Earthquake and at the request of Japanese government agencies to help conserve energy resources during the summer months. SEMICON Japan 2011 is now scheduled for December 7-9 in the same venue as PVJapan.

"2011 started strong, with customer demand in January and February tracking our expectations for a first quarter of above-seasonal growth," said Rich Templeton, TI CEO. "But the Japan earthquake that's taken such a heartbreaking human toll in the country also disrupted local demand starting in mid-March and impaired operations at two of our factories there."