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Toshiba Aims for 20% Global Share of Large Flat-Screen TVs in 2010

Posted on: Monday, 12 June 2006, 12:00 CDT

By Kyodo News International, Tokyo

Jun. 12--TOKYO -- Toshiba Corp., one of Japan's electronics giants, aims to have a 20 percent share of the global market for next-generation televisions with large, high-resolution flat screens in 2010, the company's president said recently.

Toshiba has decided to delay by 18 months to the end of next year its launch of the TVs known as surface-conduction electron-emitter display TVs.

But Toshiba President Atsutoshi Nishida denied in a recent interview with Kyodo News that the company will lag behind its rivals in competing for market shares of flat-screen TVs.

Due to intensifying competition among rival makers, liquid crystal display TVs and plasma TVs have become more common, Nishida said. "SED technologies are complicated. But their quality is visibly superior." SED features high-resolution images with less power consumption than plasma and LCD displays.

Toshiba plans to start mass-production of SED TVs, expecting a growth in demand ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, he said.

"We aim to gain a 20 percent share in the global market for large, flat-screen TVs in 2010, helped by our high quality that other companies will not be able to imitate." Nishida also said Toshiba will strengthen its cooperation with SanDisk Corp. of the United States in developing flash memory wafers in order to keep a 40 percent share in the global market.

"It is impossible for us to beat (the market leader) Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea," he said, adding that Toshiba will use its technologies that almost match Samsung's, such as those for miniaturization, and seek to develop "products whose prices would never collapse." Last month, Toshiba Corp. said it will make capital investments totaling 2.04 trillion yen over three years through fiscal 2008, including about 1 trillion yen to strengthen its computer chip business.

Its fiscal 2006-2008 business plan shows Toshiba will expand production of flash memory chips by building its fourth and fifth domestic plants amid increasing demands for NAND-type memories mainly used in digital cameras and portable music players.

As for the benefits of acquiring Westinghouse Electric Co., the U.S. nuclear power plant arm of British Nuclear Fuels Plc., Nishida said, "We are set to receive orders from a U.S. electric power company.""If we successfully receive the orders, they are beyond the amount we could produce immediately," he said.

Toshiba expects to complete the purchase of necessary shares of Westinghouse for the acquisition between July and September. The company expects to mark 600 billion to 700 billion yen in sales from its nuclear business by 2015.

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To see more of Kyodo News International, go to http://www.kyodonews.com

Copyright (c) 2006, Kyodo News International, Tokyo

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: Kyodo News International, Tokyo

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