Mazda Motor Corp said on Tuesday that it and Ford Motor Co would use both of their production facilities to produce cars under a platform-sharing agreement. Mazda, owned 33.4 per cent by Ford, also said in a statement that there would be cases of Ford producing Mazda vehicles and vice versa.

Mazda expects real benefits from platform-sharing with Ford after the year 2000, it said. But it refused to disclose details of future products and production sites. Japanese media on Tuesday quoted Ford executive vice-chairman Wayne Booker as telling reporters in Dearborn, Michigan, that Mazda's work force was likely to increase as a result of future platform-sharing.

Hitachi develops ASIC with combined DRAM, logic

Hitachi Ltd said on Tuesday it developed a new application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) which combines dynamic random access memory (DRAM) and logic in a single silicon chip.

Through the adoption of a DRAM micromodule architecture, the chip increases efficiency in data transfers by up to 100 times that of systems which use an external DRAM, and also reduces power requirement by up to one-twentieth of that of previous systems.

Sony Corp shares jump to record high

Shares of electronics giant Sony Corp jumped to an all-time high on Tuesday morning, helped by the bullishness in the technology sector, traders said.

The share price briefly went as high as 10,300 yen, breakingthe previous record of 10,100 yen marked on June 3. As of 0110 GMT, the shares were 100 yen higher at 10,200. Turnover of Sony's shares stood at 977,400.Japan energy firm to sell garbage fuel technology

Japan's Electric Power Development Co said on Tuesday it plans to market to local governments technology for generating electric power from garbage.

A spokesman for the company, which is two-thirds owned by the government, said it will build a 3.5 billion yen ($30.7 million) pilot plant in the western Japan city of Kitakyushu in late August to generate electricity using refuse-derived fuel (RDF), which is made from household garbage. It will begin marketing the facility's technology to local governments in the business year starting in April 1999.

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