Matsushita

After nearly a century of existence, Matsushita Electric Industrial is ditching its founder's name to trade under one name globally -- Panasonic, its best-known brand -- hoping this and an $11 billion reserve of cash will increase its growth outside Japan and help the company compete with rivals like Samsung and Sony.

Expansion overseas is an urgent task for Matsushita, which earns half its revenue from its home base of Japan, where the population is aging. Sony earns more than three quarters of its sales outside Japan, helped in part by its strong brand name.

Get ready to never leave your home. Pioneer announced this week a read-only Blu-ray technology that could put up to 48 hours, or 400GB, of movies on a single disc.

By comparison, the current Blu-ray Disc format stores 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer version. A 50GB Blu-ray disc can hold up to about six hours of high-definition video.

16 Layers

The new Pioneer technology has 16 layers on a conventional 12-centimeter optical disc, and is currently a play-only version. The company has indicated that a writable version is being developed.