Gartner analysts have advised CIOs in the Asia Pacific region to plan for future growth. Speaking in the opening keynote presentation at the Gartner Symposium/ITxpo in Sydney, Senior Vice President and Global Head of Research Peter Sondergaard said that an economic downturn can be a perfect time to undertake projects that warrant priority, because of their impact on future growth.

Taiwan stocks rose 0.15 percent on Friday to a more than two-week closing high, as DRAM makers such as Powerchip surged after saying Japanese rival Elpida would boost its stake in their joint venture. DRAM chip makers surged, with Powerchip and Nanya Technology both up by their 7 percent daily limit, helping lift the electronics sub-index by 0.63 percent.

Chip makers are shutting down less-productive factories, delaying investment projects and even cutting staff in a sign that the global economic slowdown and the credit crunch are taking a hefty toll on demand and hurting their operations. The coming few months could be critical for several memory-chip makers in Asia, Europe and the US as they continue to grapple with weak demand and a severe cash crunch amid plunging chip prices, which remain well below their manufacturing costs.

Infineon said on Saturday that Fairchild Semiconductor's patent lawsuit against the German chip maker had been filed in response to a similar case brought by Infineon against its US rival. The two companies are in a legal tussle over so called power chips that regulate electricity supply in computers, sold by Infineon under its CoolMOS and OptiMOS as well as Infineon IGBT and CanPak brands.

German micro-chip maker Infineon (IFXGn.DE: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) plans to step up its recent cost cutting programme and is in talks with shop stewards about shortened working weeks, it said on Saturday. A spokesman for the company confirmed a pre-release of a report in Sunday paper Welt am Sonntag that Infineon was to slash costs beyond the 200 million euro ($258.8 million) programme already announced.

Fab capacity utilisation in Q3 was high for advanced processes and 300mm fabs but overall showed a decline, according to the latest Semiconductor Industry Capacity Statistics (SICAS) report, with the foundry industry experiencing sharp declines in capacity, actual wafer starts and capacity utilisation.

Investors are also expecting a decline in mobile phone demand in 2009. Dow component Intel Corp slid 1.3 percent to $13.80 while Applied Material was off 0.9 percent to $9.64 and National Semiconductor slid 1.8 percent to $11.05.

STMicroelectronics NV, Europe's largest semiconductor maker, said fourth-quarter revenue and gross margin will miss forecasts after a slowdown in demand from the wireless, automotive and computer peripherals industries.

The European Commission on Thursday officially approved an Ericsson-STMicroelectronics joint venture to provide wireless platforms for handsets and semiconductors for mobile communications.

The world's top two contract chip makers, TSMC and UMC, are preparing to cut costs by up to 20 percent as their industry heads into a sharp downturn, industry sources said on Friday. Taking about a two-thirds share of the global foundry market together, the two Taiwan firms are facing a global economic slowdown that has forced consumers to cut spending on new PCs, cellphones and flat-screen TVs that require microchips.

AMD's manufacturing arm which is heading for a spin-off to form a foundry services provider, regards the current downturn as a good anti-cyclical investment opportunity. Nevertheless, the company is aware of the challenges they are approaching, said two top managers of the company. While the Foundry Company will maintain and expand its production capacity in Dresden and later plans to build a new fab in upstate New York, the headquarters will be placed in the Silicon Valley.

"Certainly we wouldn't abandon this industry" in Taiwan, which accounts for about 30 percent of global supplies, Siew said yesterday at an American Chamber of Commerce meeting in Taipei, when asked what the government would do to support the dynamic random access memory (DRAM) market. "We should take this opportunity to consolidate the industry to become more competitive," he said.

The decision by Samsung to abandon its six-inch, or 150-millimeter, wafer fabrication lines and focus production on its eight-inch and 12-inch wafer lines reflects a desperate attempt to improve the efficiency of its product lineup.

The Nikkei business daily said Elpida, the world's No. 3 maker of dynamic random access memory, will need to spend about 4 billion yen ($42 million) to raise its stake in Rexchip Electronics.

Japanese electronics conglomerate Toshiba is considering delaying construction of two new domestic chip plants amid slowing demand and falling prices, Kyodo news agency reported on Wednesday.

Semiconductor equipment companies are using memory semiconductor recession as opportunity to grow further. World economic downturn has hit both local and foreign equipment makers, so local makers believe that if the memory semiconductor market is recovered, only companies that have done their best to cut cost will take the benefit of semiconductor market recovery.

"There is no denying that fundamental weakness in demand is turning from bad to worse," Irvin Seah, an economist at DBS Group Holdings Ltd. in Singapore, said in a report today. The outlook for manufacturers in the coming months "will not be a pretty picture."

"In view of the current global financial turmoil we are drawing $400 million under our revolving credit facility. This is a proactive financial decision in order to secure availability of this facility in a turbulent financial market environment," said Karl-Henrik Sundstrom, NXP's chief financial officer, in a statement.

The European Commission Wednesday cleared Swedish mobile telecommunications company Ericsson (ERIC) and STMicroelectronics NV to jointly produce chipsets for mobile phones.

Rambus shares surged for the second straight day Wednesday after the chip maker received a positive pre-trial ruling in California in its patent case against some of the largest semiconductor companies in the world. According to a court document on Rambus's Web site, on Monday a U.S. District judge issued a summary decision in favor of Rambus, saying the chip makers infringed on certain aspects of Rambus's patents. The chipmakers named in the case are Hynix Semiconductor, Samsung Electronics, Nanya Technology and Micron Technology.

Lam Research has become the latest capital equipment industry company to announce layoffs, this week stating it would cut 600 jobs. The workforce reduction represents approximately 15% of Lam's total headcount and will impact regular, temporary, and contract employee positions, according to an SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) filing made Thursday.

In a report titled "Death by 1000 paper cuts: Cutting estimates and targets on most chip firms," FBR Capital Markets downgraded its estimates for several semiconductor industry companies including AMD, Maxim, and National Semiconductor.

Solar energy industry will receive moderate and no long-lasting impacts from global financial market, said Wang Runsheng, CEO of China's major solar cell producer China Sunergy. As the main driving force of solar photovoltaic (PV) industry, governmental subsidy policies haven't been removed or delayed due to the financial turmoil, said Wang, citing recent solar-favoring legislative adjustment in France.

When the American subprime crisis first knocked the dollar off its pedestal last year, boosting the euro to record levels, European chip-maker STMicroelectronics felt the pain. So in some ways, the threat of a truly global downturn has come as something of a relief to STMicro as the currency environment becomes more favorable and allows its restructuring efforts to shine through.

The new QFN package family, referred to as QFNs-se, features a higher number of thin I/O terminal pads as compared to conventional single or dual row QFN or leadframe-based Quad Flat Packages (QFP). The QFNs-se can accommodate three or more rows of terminals in a fine fixed or variable pitch, providing a wider pin count range of 50 to 250 I/O as compared to standard QFN packages which have 4 to 156 I/O. The QFNs-se is also considered to be a cost effective alternative to lower ball count Fine Pitch Ball Grid Array (FBGA) packages.

Shares of Analog Devices Inc. slid Tuesday after the chip maker warned first-quarter earnings will miss Wall Street's expectations by at least 11 cents by share. Goldman Sachs analyst Craig Hettenbach said the company's reluctance to cut jobs in order to bring down expenses has dragged on the stock. But he reiterated a "Buy" rating on shares, focusing on the company's "leadership position in data converters, where revenue increased" 8 percent year-over-year.

Spansion, one of the world's largest makers of flash memory chips, on Monday offered a grim sales outlook for the current quarter, citing a slowdown in demand as customers shut down factories. Spansion also said it is cutting cost of goods sold by about 25 percent and cutting operating expenses.

Americans expect to limit credit-card purchases, seek out bargains and stretch spending as recession fears put a damper on their holiday cheer. If the gloomiest predictions come true, that could spell disaster for many more store chains and their employees, and provide insight on how long it may take the economy to recover.

The symbolism was hard to miss when the award was handed to Chang by Hector Ruiz, a longtime friend and the chairman of Advanced Micro Devices. AMD just became the latest U.S. company to make plans to divest its factories–to a new foundry venture that will compete with TSMC. “I never look at any competition lightly,” Chang said, but predicts problems for the new foundry because suppliers and customers will be far from its main locations.

The board of directors of the Empire State Development had been scheduled to vote on whether to transfer a US$1.2 billion package of state incentives from Sunnyvale-based AMD to The Foundry Co., a joint venture between AMD and UAE-based Advanced Technology Investment. Instead, that vote has been postponed until a December meeting, according to AMD and state officials. However, Travis Bullard, a spokesman for AMD, said the decision to push off a vote until the board’s December meeting does not delay the plant.

Amid a downturn in DRAMs, Samsung Electronics remains the top supplier in the arena, according to the new rankings from Gartner. In terms of sales, Samsung was the world's largest DRAM maker in the third quarter of 2008, followed by in order Hynix, Elpida, Qimonda, Micron, Nanya, Powerchip and ProMOS, according to the rankings. Germany's Qimonda AG gained share and took fourth place, surpassing Micron. But Qimonda's fortunes could be short lived.

German chemicals company BASF Wednesday said it will temporarily shutter 80 plants worldwide due to a "massive" demand decline in key industries, particularly the auto industry, as it warned of sliding profits. The move will affect 20,000 workers, including 5,000 in Ludwigshafen, Germany.

Siimpel announced today that it has completed an investment round in support of its groundbreaking MEMS technology and product development for mobile camera applications. DoCoMo Capital, the corporate venture arm of NTT DoCoMo, has joined Siimpel's existing strategic investors from the mobile market.