panasonic

Last week, rumors began emerging of a planned wireless entertainment device from Google. That may sound cool, but before Google jumps headfirst into the brutally competitive and low-margin consumer electronics business, it should recall how similar moves nearly crushed Cisco.

It's hard to complain too much about how Japan "stole" the high-tech electronics business from the U.S. More accurately, they took a low-margin business off our hands. And you know what we should be saying to that? Good riddance!

No segment of the electronics industry better highlights the challenges of these times than the television business. With sales of standard TVs flagging, the industry is pinning its hopes to new models TVs equipped to handle Internet streaming, WiFi and more.

Tesla Motors, which went public with much fanfare last June, nearly tripled its losses for 2010 as it invested heavily to engineer and get ready for producing the Model S, its second offering and the first that targets a broader consumer market.

Positive earnings outlooks among some of Japan's major companies continued to boost investor sentiment. Japan's Nikkei 225 Index added 0.4% to close at 10,636. Hong Kong's Hang Seng slid 0.3% to end the day at 23,484. Markets in China remained closed for Chinese New Year.

Panasonic is gearing up to challenge Nintendo and Sony with a new handheld video-game player code-named "Jungle," Bloomberg News reported Tuesday. After leaving the portable-gaming market a decade ago, can this new device make Panasonic a major player?

Panasonic Corp. (PC) will begin selling its own smartphone in Japan in 2011 and overseas in 2012. The new phone will use the Google (GOOG) Android operating system, Reuters reported. Panasonic stopped selling phones overseas in 2006 and is forecast to sell 5.4 million to 5.5 million phones in...

Panasonic is recharging electric-car company Tesla Motors with $30 million. The electronics manufacturer, which provides batteries for Tesla's cars, will now own 2% of its customer. The deal also puts Tesla back in the battery business.

Panasonic (PC) will re-enter the portable gaming market after more than a decade with a hand-held device called "The Jungle." The device will be a clamshell, with a screen on one side and a keyboard on the other, TechCrunch reported. Sponsored Links The Jungle will be a product of a new...

Panasonic Corp. and a Whirlpool Corp. subsidiary agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy charges and pay $140.9 million in criminal fines for their roles in a price-fixing plot, the Department of Justice announced. Panasonic, a Japanese corporation, and Embraco, a Delaware-based refrigerant...