Why Australian Defence Force Ambulance in Alor Star?

Bukit Selambau full of poster and Police

Another Layoff Tracker(more complete)

For times to times update pls go
http://portalseven.com/common/Home.jsp

Company	Date	Number	Location	Sector	Source
Norwegian American Hospital	February 19, 2009	42	USA	Health Care	Employment Spectator
Avon	February 19, 2009	3000	USA	Consumer Services	Employment Spectator
Embraer	February 19, 2009	4000	BRAZIL	Industrials	Bloomberg
Borders Group	February 19, 2009	136	USA	Consumer Services	Forbes
Sears	February 19, 2009	300	Canada	Consumer Services	thestar.com
Macys	February 19, 2009	7000	USA	Consumer Services	CNN Money
Goodyear	February 18, 2009	5000	USA	Consumer Goods	MarketWatch
California Govt.	February 17, 2009	20000	California	-	AP
Delphi	February 17, 2009	800	USA	Consumer Goods	TOPNEWS
MDU Resources	February 17, 2009	130	USA	Industrials	Forbes
ABX Air	February 17, 2009	350	USA	Industrials	BusinessJounal
Agilent Technologies	February 17, 2009	600	USA	Technology	BARRONs
General Motors	February 17, 2009	47000	USA	Consumer Goods	Yahoo
Smithfield Foods	February 17, 2009	1800	USA	Consumer Services	AP
Johnson Controls	February 17, 2009	80	USA	Industrials	Forbes
WAL-MART	February 17, 2009	400	USA	Consumer Services	Forbes
Chrysler	February 17, 2009	3000	USA	Consumer Goods	Employment Spectator
University of Washington	February 17, 2009	600	USA	Consumer Services	Seattle Times
BMW	February 16, 2009	850	UK	Consumer Goods	WSJ
MindTree	February 16, 2009	70	Banglore, India	Technology	MSN India
Sapient	February 14, 2009	300	Banglore	Technology	THE TIMES OF INDIA
Nokia	February 13, 2009	320	Worldwide	Technology	WSJ
United Technologies	February 13, 2009	1000	Canada	Technology	wtop.com
Fortunoff	February 13, 2009	300	USA	Consumer Services	NewsDay.com
U.S. Airways	February 12, 2009	233	USA	Consumer Services	Business Times
Pioneer	February 12, 2009	10000	Worldwide	-	Reuters
Nokia	February 12, 2009	625	Finland	Telecommunications	Business-Standard
Nike	February 11, 2009	1400	Worldwide	Consumer Goods	India.com
Applied Micro Circuits	February 11, 2009	100	SUNNYVALE, CA, USA	Technology	Yahoo
W.W. Grainger	February 11, 2009	400	Worldwide	Industrials	Chicago Breaking News
WAL-MART	February 11, 2009	800	USA	Consumer Services	AdAge
GE Transportation	February 11, 2009	1550	USA	Industrials	BusinessTimes
Emerson Electric	February 11, 2009	14000	USA	Industrials	Employment Spectator
Nissan	February 10, 2009	20000	Worldwide	Consumer Goods	NYTimes
General Motors	February 10, 2009	10000	USA	Consumer Goods	Business Pundit
Chartered Semiconductor	February 10, 2009	600	Worldwide	Technology	WSJ
Beazer Homes	February 10, 2009	300	USA	Industrials	NYTimes
PIPER AIRCRAFT INC	February 10, 2009	300	USA	Consumer Services	Piper
NetApp	February 09, 2009	480	USA	Technology	U. K. Register
LA Times, The Tribune Co.	February 05, 2009	300	USA	Consumer Services	LA Times
Cisco	February 05, 2009	2000	San Jose, CA	Technology	BusinessWeek
Estee Lauder	February 05, 2009	2000	NEW YORK	Consumer Goods	BusinessWeek
THQ	February 05, 2009	600	USA	Technology	Invest-n-Trade
Time Warner Cable	February 04, 2009	1250	USA	Consumer Services	Yahoo
Panasonic	February 04, 2009	15000	Tokyo, Japan	Consumer Goods	Bllomberg
PNC Financial Services	February 03, 2009	5800	USA	Financials	LA Times
Electronic Arts	February 03, 2009	600	Redwood City, CA	Technology	SIlicon Alley Insider
Bloomberg	February 03, 2009	100	New York, NY	Consumer Services	Reuters
Huntington Bancshares	February 03, 2009	500	USA	Financials	Employment

Spansion Mulls Alternatives; Skips Payment On Notes

Some interesting comment I found from some blogs....

Will Spansion and Numonyx merge??

http://blogs.barrons.com/techtraderdaily/2009/01/15/spansion-mulls-alternatives-skips-interest-payment-on-notes/?mod=yahoobarrons

January 15, 2009, 9:53 am

Spansion Mulls Alternatives; Skips Payment On Notes

Posted by Eric Savitz

Spansion (SPSN) this morning said it has been exploring strategic alternatives, including the possible merger or sale of the company, which makes NOR flash memory chips. The company has hired Barclays Capital as a financial adviser.

The company also said it has begun discussions on “potential balance sheet restructuring opportunities,” and will delay making the interest payment due today on its 11.25% senior notes due 2016. Spansion said that under the indenture governing the notes, a failure to make an interest payment is subject to a 30-day cure period.

Spansion this morning is up a penny, or 6.9%, to 19 cents.

Comments

Report offensive comments to techtraderdaily@barrons.com

Francisco Partners ought to be very interested in Spansion. The private equity firm Francisco Partners is part-owner of Numonyx. With a merger, Spansion and Numonyx can stop the price war in high-density NOR flash, have better control over supply, and completely dominate multi-bit per cell NOR flash (MirrorBit and StrataFlash). EcoRAM and ORNAND2, if they work, would be additional bonuses.

Comment by CLiHsing - January 15, 2009 at 1:48 pm

Spansion names CEO, but is Micron eyeing firm?

http://www.eetimes.com/news/semi/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=213001560&pgno=1

Mark LaPedus Page 1 of 2 EE Times  (02/04/2009 10:25 AM EST) SAN JOSE, Calif. -- It's been a wild week for Spansion Inc. The NOR-flash leader Wednesday (Feb. 4) named John Kispert, former president and COO of KLA-Tencor Corp., as its new chief executive and member of the board. He replaces Bertrand Cambou, who stepped down earlier this week. Now, rumors are running rampant that Micron Technology Inc. is looking at buying Spansion (Sunnyvale, Calif.), sources said. Micron is a major player in NAND flash, DRAM and CMOS image sensors, but it has no presence in NOR. ''Micron could use the manufacturing facilities, IP, and perhaps try to sustain some of the NOR/NROM/EcoRAM markets that Spansion created,'' according to one analyst. Spansion's NOR devices are based on NROM technology. Last year, Spansion rolled out a new class of memory that is said to replace DRAMs in the datacenter, dubbed EcoRAM. Micron declined to comment. ''It's Micron's policy to not comment on rumor or speculation,'' according to a spokesman for Micron (Boise, Ida.). Last year, Micron signed a definitive agreement to acquire Qimonda AG's 35.6 percent ownership stake in Taiwan DRAM venture Inotera Memories Inc. for $400 million in cash. For some time, there have been reports that Micron is also interested in buying Qimonda, which has filed insolvency at a Munich court. That deal has yet to happen. Like Qimonda, Spansion is running out of options amid losses and poor demand. On Jan. 15, Spansion announced it was exploring strategic alternatives for a sale or merger. The company also announced plans to restructure its balance sheet. Sources indicate that Spansion is mulling bankruptcy fillings. At one time, Toshiba Corp. was looking at Spansion. The problems reached a boiling point when Cambou resigned. Earlier this week, Boaz Eitan, an executive vice president and member of the board, was named interim president of Spansion. Kispert, former president and COO of KLA-Tencor, brings operational and financial experience to Spansion. ''As CEO, Kispert expects to intensify Spansion's strategic and restructuring initiatives to build value for the company's stakeholders, leveraging the company's leadership in the flash memory industry,'' according to Spansion.

Where did Spansion go wrong?

Still, the question remains: Where did Spansion go wrong?

''As the leading supplier to a stagnant market, Spansion has been trying to blaze new trails for their NOR technology, developing ORNAND, a cross between NOR and NAND flash, and focusing on using MirrorBit flash as a power-saving replacement for DRAM in servers,'' said Jim Handy, an analyst with Objective Analysis (Los Altos, Calif.).

''It's too early to tell whether this last will be accepted -- that process is likely to take another two years or more since the approach is revolutionary and acceptance will be slow. ORNAND could have done very well in a typical NAND market, one where NAND makers dropped their lower-density product in pursuit of sales of more profitable high-density devices,'' he said.

''The trouble is, there's such a huge NAND glut today that all NAND makers are taking orders for low density parts that they would have otherwise abandoned. It's better to sell an unprofitable part than to leave their fabs idle. This is not the only way that the NAND market's glut has harmed Spansion,'' he said.

''Major NOR makers profit by selling their highest-density parts. These parts are under extreme price pressure since their key market is camera phones, and these designs can be worked to either use a large NOR, or the combination of a small NOR plus a large NAND. Some designs are even converting to NAND alone. Unless the NOR is sold at a very low price, today's cheap NAND is likely to capture the bulk of the design's flash revenues,'' he said.

What will likely happen to Spansion? Bankruptcy is one option.

''Should the company be forced into bankruptcy several alternatives are available, the best of which will be chosen by the bankruptcy arbitrator,'' Handy said.

''One would simply be for the company's debt to be restructured and business would continue as before. The most dramatic opposite stance would be for the company to be liquidated -- all the employees would be furloughed and assets would be sold off. We see neither of these as likely,'' he said. ''This is good news for the company's customers, who, in a liquidation, would be forced to redesign several products to use competitors' parts.''

Is there another option? ''Although an argument can be made for the sale of Spansion's manufacturing capacity since it consists of hard assets, Objective Analysis believes that the asset that is most likely to be sold to the company's advantage would be their intellectual property,'' he said. ''It is quite possible that some licensing agreement will gather Spansion enough cash to see the company through its current difficulties, however any purchaser would be a visionary with the patience to wait a year or two before seeing any revenue stream.''

Pls go to website for time to time update
http://www.forbes.com/2008/11/17/layoff-tracker-unemployement-lead-cx_kk_1118tracker.html?partner=popstories

Pink Slips

Layoff Tracker

Compiled by Klaus Kneale, 01.28.09, 07:12 PM EST

Starbucks fires 7,000, Target cuts 600 and AOL cans 700.

Number of layoffs since Nov. 1, 2008, at America's 500 largest public companies*:

350,725

Latest layoffs:

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Jan. 28: Boeing (nyse: BA - news - people ) increases previously announced layoffs--bringing total to 10,000 workers, or 6% of the company’s workforce.

Jan. 28: Starbucks (nasdaq: SBUX - news - people ) organizes closings at 900 stores worldwide and fires 6,700 in the process.

Jan. 28: Target (nyse: TGT - news - people ) cuts 400 open positions and 600 employees on sagging sales.

Jan. 27: Time Warner’s (nyse: TWX - news - people ) AOL reduces workforce by 10% (700 workers) as it fights declining ad revenue.

Jan. 27: Cabinet company Merillat--a subsidiary of Masco (nyse: MAS - news - people )--cuts 20% of workforce (70 workers).

Hitachi faces loss due to Renesas

http://www.eetimes.com/rss/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212900878&cid=RSSfeed_eetimes_newsRSS



Reuters
EE Times
(01/15/2009 11:12 PM EST)


TOKYO, Jan 16 -- Hitachi Ltd., Japan's biggest electronics maker, now faces an annual net loss of more than $1.1 billion instead of a previously forecast profit, hurt by a sharp decline in microchip sales, sources said on Friday.

A growing number of major Japanese electronics makers are expected to suffer big losses for the year ending in March, as the global economy visibly contracts.

A source said this week that Sony Corp would likely post an annual operating loss of $1.1 billion, its first such loss in 14 years, while media and analysts say rival Toshiba Corp is also headed for a big loss.

Hitachi now eyes a net loss of more than 100 billion yen ($1.1 billion) for the year to March -- its third year of losses -- due to a large loss at Renesas Technology Corp, a chipmaking joint venture of Hitachi and Mitsubishi Electric Corp, two sources with direct knowledge of the matter said.

Renesas, the world's No.7 maker of semiconductors, is expected to book a net loss of about 200 billion yen, as usage rates halved on equipment used to make chips, said a Renesas source who declined to be named because the numbers are not yet public.

Renesas, which makes chips used in cars, TVs, cameras and hard drives, will also shoulder restructuring costs and a write-down of tax-related assets, reversing an earlier projection for a 9.5 billion yen net profit.

A spokesman at Hitachi, which owns 55 percent of Renesas, declined to comment on the report.

Hitachi, the world's No. 3 maker of hard drives, has already cut its annual net profit forecast to 15 billion yen from an initial estimate of 40 billion yen, when it reported half-year results in October.

That compares with an average forecast of a 2.3 billion yen net loss in a poll of 11 analysts by Reuters Estimates.

Hitachi, which has been restructuring its hard drive business and gaining profit in its nuclear and thermal power plants, is also suffering from halting orders for automotive equipment and sluggish sales in its flat-panel TVs and other electronics, a Hitachi source said.

Shutoku Watanabe, head of Hitachi's consumer business group, told Reuters this month that the company's annual LCD TV sales would likely be as much as 10 percent below target as consumers hold off on off big-ticket purchases.

Hitachi had already cut its LCD TV sales forecast for the year to end-March to 850,000 units from 1.2 million.

Shares of Hitachi were trading down 0.6 percent against the benchmark Nikkei average, which was up 1.5 percent. (Additional reporting by Taiga Uranaka and Ted Kerr; Editing by Chris Gallagher)


By: Mayumi Negishi and Kentaro Hamada
Copyright 2009 Reuters.