By January next year, Hitachi Displays Ltd., Hitachi's wholly owned panel subsidiary, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd. and Toshiba Corp. will set up a joint venture capitalized at 70 billion yen (642 million dollars).

"The objective of this venture is to strengthen our global competitiveness," said Fumiaki Yonai, president of Hitachi Displays, told a news conference.

The announcement followed the completion of the world's largest next-generation LCD panel plant in South Korea between Samsung Electronics and Sony Corp. last month.

Toshiba president Tadashi Okamura said the venture was the best way to beat domestic and foreign rivals in the global flat-screen television market.

"It is the best and necessary option for us to win the competition against domestic and foreign makers," Okamura said.

"We have been strengthening the flat-screen television business and strongly believe that this venture will help us boost this business further," he said.

Hitachi Displays owns a 50-percent stake in the venture, with the remaining half split between Matsushita and Toshiba, the three said, adding they would also invest 110 billion yen.

Worldwide demand for LCD TVs was estimated to have reached three million units in 2003 and is forecast to expand fivefold in 2006. By 2008, it is likely to hit 28 million to 30 million worldwide.

"Global demand for flat screen televisions keeps rising and we would like to provide high-quality televisions at reasonable prices," said Matsushita president Kunio Nakamura.

The Hitachi-led venture will produce LCD panels mainly for 26- to 32-inch flat-screen televisions.

Hitachi president Etsuhiko Shoyama said the venture wanted to win more than a 20-percent share in the global LCD flat-screen television market.

"Of the (estimated) 30 million LCD flat televisions in the global market in 2008, about 10 million units will be 26-32 inches flat-screen televisions," Shoyama said.

"Among those 10 million units, we are planning to take over more than 20 percent of the market share," he said.

The venture, which has yet to be named, will build a new production line at Hitachi Display's factory in Mobara factory in Chiba, southeast of Tokyo, with production scheduled in 2006.

Its production capacity will reach 2.5 million 32-inch TV LCD panels a year.

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