Today, leading entertainment technology developer e.Digital Corporation announced that it has entered a cross licensing and settlement agreement with Samsung Electronics Co, Ltd. Under the terms of the agreement, Samsung obtained a license and release on e.Digital’s foreign and domestic patent rights, including the company’s Flash-R™ patent portfolio. e.Digital, meanwhile, obtained a license and release on certain Samsung patents; the company also received a one-time licensing fee.

e.Digital’s Flash-R patent portfolio incorporates flash memory in the large, growing portable electronic products market. In 1993, the company introduced the first portable recorder with removable flash memory. Today, many consumer electronics products use flash memory including cell phones, digital cameras, camcorders, PDAs and other popular devices, a testament to e.Digital’s innovative success.

Fred Falk, president and CEO of e.Digial, stated, “We are pleased to have successfully concluded the first round of our intellectual property (IP) licensing strategy by licensing and settling all seven

...

Future sustainable growth of Qualcomm Inc (QCOM) is all set to come from its state-of-the-art next-generation Snapdragon technology platform. A major initiative of Qualcomm is the convergence of mobile computing with its Snapdragon solutions. These chipsets have been designed for pocket-sized portable computing devices.  This platform enables phone manufacturers to develop high-speed and more power efficient smart-phones and smart-books. We believe diversification into the mobile computing market was necessary for Qualcomm due to lukewarm growth of the company’s ordinary mobile phone chipset market. Massive growth of smart-phones may make up for these losses.  As of now, over 15 mobile device manufacturers are developing more than 30 Snapdragon-based products. Several leading software developers have started writing applications for mobile operating system, multimedia player, social networking, and productivity development tools based on the Snapdragon platform.  Acer Inc, Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., and LG Electronics Inc are the ...

Sony Corp. (NYSE ADR: SNE) is facing the first consecutive annual loss of its 63-year history.

The Tokyo-based company lost $1.1 billion (98.9 billion yen) last year, and it expects to lose another $1.4 billion (120 billion yen) in its fiscal year ending March 31.  That would be Sony’s first back-to-back annual loss since the company went public in 1958.

And despite renewed optimism within its ranks, Sony still faces a plethora of challenges, including a questionable direction, cost-conscious consumers and a strengthening yen.

The onetime bellwether of the electronics industry has seen its market share crumble in almost every category: Nintendo Co. Ltd.’s (OTC ADR: NTDOY) Wii game console has supplanted Sony’s PlayStation brand, Sony has given up its lead in portable media players to Apple Inc.’s (Nasdaq: AAPL) iPod, and Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. is now the world’s largest seller of televisions.

Hoping to turn the

...

Qualcomm Inc (QCOM) is all set to start selling chipsets for smart-books from the next quarter onward. The company is the largest developer of digital mobile chipsets based on CDMA wireless technology. This new venture into the smart-book market will be a vertical diversification for the company. A smart-book is a pocket digital assistant (PDA) that functions like a mobile phone but resembles a small-size notebook with full keyboards. The chipset market for computer is primarily dominated by Intel Inc (INTC). Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) and Texas Instruments Inc (TXN) are other major players. Qualcomm has developed smart-book chipsets based on its state-of-the-art Snapdragon platform technology. A path-breaking initiative of the company is the convergence of mobile computing with the next-generation Snapdragon platform. These chipsets have been designed for pocket-sized portable computing devices. Using Snapdragon chipsets, the consumers will no ...

Today we are featuring top-performing "Pacific" equity mutual funds, which primarily invest in stocks of companies that are based in.

Investors can find such funds by checking out the entire list of the Zacks #1 Rank Pacific Equity Funds.3 Pacific Picks

SPARX Asia Pacific Equity Income (SPAIX) was incepted in August 2007 and seeks long-term capital appreciation. The fund is non-diversified.

The fund normally invests at least 80% of its net assets in dividend-paying companies located in the Asia Pacific region, excluding Japan. It invests in companies regardless of market capitalization.

Tom Naughton has been the lead portfolio manager at the fund since its inception, focusing exclusively on Asia ex-Japan. The fund has an expense ratio of 1.60%.

Fidelity Advisor Emerging Asia A (FEAAX) seeks long-term capital appreciation. It normally invests primarily in common stocks of Asian emerging market

...

Deutsche Bank Drops $6.3 Billion in 4Q; Nortel Files for Chap. 11; Lehman Out of Chap. 11 in 18-24 Months; Work on World’s Tallest Building Delayed; Yahoo Tunes in to Asian Players; Record Job Cuts; More Adults Downloading TV; D-TV Switch Could be Delayed

Germany’s largest bank, Deutsche Bank AG, reported a fourth quarter loss of about $6.3 billion (4.8 billion euros), prompting its shares to fall as much as 13% on the news. A year earlier, the bank posted a profit of about $1.3 billion (1 billion euros), Bloomberg reported. Nortel Networks Corp., the largest telephone equipment maker in North America, yesterday (Wednesday) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. “Based on this filing, the board of directors must believe that not only is the fourth quarter bad, but ...