Philips Abandons Consumer Electronics, Sells Business [WSJ]

Few might believe it, just like few wanted to believe that Kodak was really leaving the camera market when it went bankrupt, but Dutch company Philips has decided to leave the consumer electronics market behind.

After 80 years of television sets, mobile phones and other products, the company is going to focus on medical equipment and lighting products.

It has sold its TV, phone and other consumer electronics assets to Funai, a company from Japan.

This means no more headphones, speakers, media players, TVs, monitors, or really any other audio, video, multimedia and accessory device bearing Philips' brand.

Philips probably wouldn't have done this if it hadn't suffered losses over the past few years, because of the division.

In the fourth quarter of 2012 alone, the net loss was of 358 million Euro, or roughly $481 million.