Southern Africa
Altech has purchased 50% of the Econet Wireless Group (EWG) for $70m. The transaction will position Altech favourably in the high-growth cellular (GSM) network operator market, it said. The operations forming the new company (currently un-named) have a total historic pro-forma turnover of approximately $200m. The assets of the latest agreement include shareholdings in Mascom Wireless Botswana (40%), Econet Wireless New Zealand (65%), Econet Wireless Limited (100%), Econet Satellite Services Limited (100%), Telikom PNG (51%), Econet Wireless Nigeria - recently renamed Vee Networks Limited (5%), Independent SMS Limited (50%), Worldstream Limited, (100%), and Econet Wireless International (100%).
Dimension Data South Africa (DDSA) has announced the conclusion of its empowerment transaction. A BEE Consortium, led by Andile Ngcaba, has acquired a 25,01% equity stake in DDSA, valued at R380m. The transaction is vendor-financed on a notional basis and will include a cash payment of R23m. The BEE Consortium consists of three key parties, namely: Ngcaba Holdings; Safika Holdings; and a group of broad-based BEE participants, involving a number of empowerment groups from around the country.
DigiCore Holdings announced strong annual results for the 12 months ended 30 June 2004. The group recorded a 45% improvement in attributable earnings to R24,3m, compared to R16,7m for 2003, as a result of normalised operating margins on an increased turnover. "It is truly satisfying to report that we have managed to achieve almost all the goals we set at the beginning of the year," said Nick Vlok, chief executive officer of DigiCore. "We are proud that London-based Thames Water chose our C-Track GPRS driven product over other world players, and are confident that this deal will provide an excellent reference site to drive new business within the European sphere. It should also open doors for DigiCore Europe, based in Holland."
Digital Mall has won the Standard Bank CPSI Public Sector Innovation award for use of IT for effective service delivery for the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) contact centre. Working in a consortium with Grintek Telecom, Emmanuels Staffing Services, and Intelleca, Digital Mall developed the Contact Centre for the IEC for the handling of all calls for the national elections. During the nine months that the centre was in operation, over 2 000 000 telephone calls were answered with an average service level of 92% of calls answered within 20 seconds.
The names of the winners of The 2004 Innovation & Sustainability Awards were announced recently. The local accolade is bestowed on innovators and innovations in the public and private sectors. This year's winners demonstrated the ingenuity with which South African government, business and charitable organisations are attacking a host of economic, social and environmental challenges. Entries for the awards this year encompassed a range of innovations - from the creation of new business processes, technologies, products, methodologies and organisational structures, through to new approaches to business, marketing and service delivery. They also covered entries from organisations of all sizes operating in a range of industry sectors and fields, including high technology, engineering, innovative goods and services for women, social development, education and environmental affairs. The Grand Prix Winner for 2004 is Intelleca South Africa for its 'English Acoustic Model for Advanced Speech Recognition'. A product of collaboration with US-based ScanSoft and the CSIR, Intelleca's new model reduces the error rate of the currently used UK speech recognition engines by between 60% and 70%, enabling a broad roll-out of commercial natural speech applications in call centres and other service industries. See www.cpsi.co.za for the full list of winners.
Harmonic Group has been awarded the exclusive local distribution rights for the Microflex range of ruggedised mobile computers developed by Canadian-based DAP Technologies. This includes a range of data-entry devices to a multitude of industries operating in harsh environments. Harmonic will also offer customers a certified service centre facility to ensure fast turnaround times on warranty claims.
Overseas
Business
National Semiconductor posted net earnings of $117,7m on revenue of $548m for Q1 2005. Revenue was 29% higher than year-ago sales, but 4% lower than the previous quarter's sales. The company attributed this decline to seasonally slow demand and shorter lead times, which prompted distributors and OEMs to reduce backlogs. "National's business over the summer was affected by slower orders than we originally anticipated, particularly from our distribution channel," said Brian Halla, National's chief executive. "However, we continued to show positive results from our analog focus and we are pleased that we were able to increase gross margin in a seasonally slow quarter."
Companies
LeCroy will acquire Computer Access Technology (CATC) for approximately $85m. LeCroy said that CATC's leadership in high-speed serial data protocol test solutions directly complements its strength in the serial data oscilloscope market. CATC's strength is in designing testing solutions for the important emerging serial data standards such as PCI Express, Serial Attached SCSI and Serial ATA.
Qualcomm has signed an agreement to acquire display technology company, Iridigm Display, for $170m. Under the transaction, Iridigm would become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Qualcomm giving Qualcomm full access to Iridigm's iMoD technology. The technology is based on a MEMS structure combined with thin film optics that promises benefits for mobile device displays said to deliver vivid display images that can be viewed in any environment.
AMIS Holdings has announced it would purchase the assets of Dspfactory, of Ontario, Canada. Dspfactory is a supplier of ultra-low power DSP technology for low-power medical devices. The company has developed a proprietary DSP-based mixed-signal platform with IP that AMIS plans to leverage for advanced hearing aids, implantable and diagnostic applications in the medical market, and industrial motor control applications.
Eastman Kodak is to acquire National Semiconductor's CMOS image sensor outfit. Kodak will purchase certain intellectual property and equipment of the operation and integrate the division into its Image Sensor Solution Department.
Japanese electronics firms Hitachi, Matsushita Electric Industrial and Toshiba said that they will form a joint venture to manufacture and sell liquid crystal display, or LCD, panels for flat-screen televisions, beginning in January 2005. The three companies plan to invest a total of 110 billion yen to build a new LCD-panel manufacturing plant at a Hitachi site in eastern Japan, where Hitachi already makes TV-use LCD panels. The JV will manufacture amorphous TFT LCD panels using Hitachi's in-plane-switching LCD system, which provides for wide-viewing angle and improved colour reproduction.
European chip company, Dialog Semiconductor, has signed a collaborative deal with the camera lens division of Carl Zeiss. The two companies have jointly developed an imaging module that has Zeiss optics and Dialogic's image sensor and integrated image processor aimed at camera-phone applications. As a result of its three-element lens and extremely aspheric surfaces, the lens can be constructed with dimensions smaller than the size of a pea, Dialog said.
Ericsson has announced it is to discontinue its design and development of new Bluetooth solutions for the semiconductor industry. A dedicated Bluetooth unit will be created to support existing customers. Ericsson will disintegrate Ericsson Technology Licensing, which Ericsson spun out to conduct Bluetooth R&D four years ago. Ericsson will continue to offer Bluetooth software technology development through is subsidiary, Ericsson Mobile Platforms.
Thales and the the Grenoble-based research arm of the French atomic energy commission (CEA Leti) have formed a new joint laboratory to work on radio frequency microelectromechanical systems (RF MEMS). The unified laboratory aims to design and develop high-power microwave microswitches and ICs based on these microswitches. Thales intends to use the microsystems for defence, security and aerospace applications including radar and radio systems.
Intel has entered into an agreement with CombiMatrix to work together on the feasibility of various projects using CombiMatrix's core technology. CombiMatrix is developing a platform technology to rapidly produce customisable active biochips, which are semiconductor-based tools for use in identifying and determining the roles of genes, gene mutations and proteins.
Ovonyx and Nanochip have signed an agreement whereby Nanochip will license Ovonyx' thin-film reversible phase-change memory technology. Nanochip will use the memory technology MEMS-based, ultra-high density data storage systems. The technology can permit the fabrication of mass storage systems with bit densities of 1-terabit per square inch, Ovonyx said.
Infineon Technologies has signed a long term licence agreement with Hitachi Global Storage Technologies (Hitachi GST) on read channel technology for hard drive applications. Under the agreement, Infineon has the right to use Hitachi read channel technology to develop and produce system-on-chip and standalone read channel devices for hard drives.
Memec Insight has been appointed as the new distribution partner for Nordic Semiconductor in Europe, which will significantly improve Nordic's presence in Europe. Sales of Nordic Semiconductor's standard components, with the 2,4 GHz components at the head, increased significantly last year. After two successful years in a distribution agreement with Memec Unique in Asia Pacific, Nordic said it had excellent reasons to expand its sales network in agreement with Memec Insight, a sister company to Memec Unique in Europe.
Industry
Worldwide chip sales in July 2004 were $16,46 bn, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), up 33,7% on the same month a year before and a significant easing of the phenomenal growth rate recorded in the first half of 2004. The 'actual' sales of $16,46 bn for July were well below the $18,0 bn three-month average reported by the SIA on 2 September. It was also down on actual sales of $16,82 bn and $20,70 bn recorded by the SIA for May and June. June 2004's 'actual' sales were up 40,3% from the actual sales in June 2003.
iSuppli has added one percentage point to its semiconductor revenue forecast for 2004, taking it up to 25,4% from 24,4% previously. It also cut its growth forecast for 2005 by more than 2 points, to 9,6%. iSuppli explained that although it has detected a slowing rate of revenue growth, because this slowing will impact revenues mainly during the fourth quarter, the second half of 2004 would still generate growth of 10% on top of the strong growth seen in the first six months of the year.
Databeans has released new studies on application specific analog markets. Communications, consumer, and computer analog and mixed-signal products constitute 71% of global analog ASSP revenue - or $11,2 bn in 2003. Strong growth in the communications market will boost revenue up to $14,2 bn this year - a 27% increase over last year. Consumer and computer products can typically require analog content worth $20, including both ASSPs and high performance linear products. Wireless handsets contain $10 to $15 worth of analog and mixed-signal products, including charge controllers, power supply ICs, mixed-signal audio, and transceivers. The fastest growing market for high volume analog ASSP, says Databeans, continues to be the wireless market, with an estimated 85% share of the total analog communications market. Databeans predicts that this market will grow at a rate of close to 20% each year for the next five years.
According to a report from RBC Capital Markets, weakness in digital camera shipments from Japan continues in the market, as July shipments were down 6% over the previous month to 4,4 million units.
China's consumer electronics sector is projected to reach $49,6 bn in sales this year, growing by more than 20% annually to reach $94 bn in 2007, according to a report from Global Sources.
Royal Philips Electronics holds a top-three position in the Chinese semiconductor market, said the company at the conclusion of a visit to China by its management board. Although Philips is strong in China in the areas of lighting and domestic lighting, the company holds top three positions in LCD monitors, medical systems and semiconductors.
A new initiative called CE-ATA, to define a storage interface for handheld and portable consumer electronic devices is being led by Intel, Hitachi, Marvell, Seagate and Toshiba. The initiative is working towards defining a standard interface for small form factor disk drives that addresses the requirements of the handheld and consumer electronics market segments, including low pin count, low voltage, power efficiency, cost effectiveness and integration efficiency.
In an effort to promote interoperability of MPEG-4 products and to encourage compliance with MPEG-4 technical standards, the MPEG Industry Forum has launched the MPEGIF Logo Qualification Program. This gives companies the opportunity to test the performance of their products in coordination with a series of approved and rigorous ISO/ITU reference streams and in conjunction with other MPEG-4 products. See http://logo.mpegif.org.
Technology
Semiconductor Manufacturing International, a Chinese silicon foundry provider, has announced the development of a high-voltage process technology. The 0,18 μm process enables 30 to 40 V devices, allowing SMIC to provide single-chip, high-voltage LCD driver technology for the emerging mobile phone market.
Matsushita Electric has announced it will begin marketing a 65" plasma display, said to be the largest available in the consumer market. Matsushita projects that global PDP demand will grow to 5 million in 2005.
Samsung Electronics has unveiled the first-ever mobile phone that sports an internal hard disk drive. The SPH-V5400, which also comes with a mega-pixel camera, is equipped with a 25,4 mm diagonal, 1,5 GB hard disk drive that greatly expands the memory capacity of mobile phones from the conventional 100 MB max. In addition, the phone boasts a high-resolution (QVGA) 56 mm liquid crystal display and includes features, such as MP3 player, electronic book and Korean-English/English-Korean dictionaries, and dual speakers that provide a 3D sound effect.
Mitsuishi Inbo, of Nagano, Japan, has developed a postcard-sized Windows PC which measures 135 x 109 x 18 mm (W x H x D). Called the HagakiPC, the company says the prototype PC weighs 340 g, including battery, and does not come with a keyboard. Instead, an LCD touch panel serves as the keyboard. The CPU is a 266 MHz AMD Geode, with 128 MB memory. It is equipped with built-in 128 MB flash memory and supports CompactFlash.
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