SYDNEY, Dec. 7 --AsiaNet/InfoQuest EBAY SALE... ST. JOHNS: GoldenPalace.com, the online casino that recentlybought the immensely popular Virgin Mary Grilled CheeseSandwich, has just bought another paranormal item on eBay, ahaunted walking cane for an unbelievable US$65,000. http://www.GoldenPalace.com MOBILE AWARDS... HONG KONG: Hong Kong based Artificial Life, Inc. announcedMonday that it has won the first prize for the mobile gamessection of the Ericsson Mobile Applications Award 2004 with itsinnovative 3G product: "V-Girl (tm) - your virtualgirlfriend". http://www.artificial-life.com ISO RENEWAL... TEMPE, Ariz.: Health and security assistance providerMedAire, Inc. has renewed its ISO 9001:2000 certification afterthe company successfully passed its bi-annual ISO audit,conducted by Australia-based International Certifications,Ltd. http://www.medaire.com COMPANY ACQUISITION... CARLSBAD, Calif.: Medex, Inc. announced Monday that SmithsGroup plc, a UK based manufacturer has agreed to acquireprivately-held Medex in a transaction which will greatlyenhance the global presence of Smiths Medical for devices usedin critical care. http://www.medex.com SEMICONDUCTOR OUTLOOK... EL SEGUNDO, California.: The market research company iSuppliCorp. issued two press releases Monday covering its revisedoutlook for semiconductor industry growth in 2005 and itspreliminary chip market share estimate for 2004. http://www.isuppli.com/news/default.asp?id=3706 http://www.isuppli.com/news/default.asp?id=3707 http://www.isuppli.com/about/index.asp PRICE INCREASE... WILMINGTON, Delaware: DuPont Titanium Technologies announcedMonday a price increase in Asia Pacific for DuPont(TM) titaniumdioxide grades effective Jan. 1, 2005. http://www.dupont.com ACCELERATION TECHNOLOGY... AUSTIN, Texas: Tehuti Networks, a fabless semiconductorcompany, has developed and is now offering TCP/IP accelerationtechnology designed for servers and motherboards that networkthrough 1- and 10-gigabit Ethernet. http://www.tehutinetworks.com NOTE ISSUE... WASHINGTON: Fannie Mae will not issue Callable BenchmarkNotes this month. http://www.fanniemae.com FANNIE MAE... WASHINGTON, D.C.: Fannie Mae will redeem the principalamount of 1 securities issue amounting to a total of US$25million on December 16 at a redemption price equal to 100 percent of the principal amount redeemed plus accrued interest. http://www.fanniemae.com NEW WEBSITE... LOS ANGELES: People around the globe will do a double takewhen they see the newly redesigned Oakwood.com, home to themost trusted name in corporate housing, Oakwood Worldwide. http://www.oakwood.com REVENUE UPDATE... SAN JOSE: Komag, Incorporated, a leading independentsupplier of thin-film media for disk drives, is updating itsrevenue outlook for the fourth quarter of 2004. http://www.komag.com MARKETING AGREEMENT... MILAN: Eurand announced Monday that it has signed adefinitive agreement with Par Pharmaceutical Companies, Inc.,to market Eurand's Potassium Chloride 20mEq tablet product. http://www.eurand.com http://www.parpharm.com RETAIL FIGURES... LONDON: The Bloomberg Retail Purchasing Managers' Index(PMI), a monthly survey indicating economic conditions in theEurozone retail sector one month ahead of government figures,reported Monday a fourth consecutive monthly decline in salesvalue figures. http://www.bloomberg.com COMPANY PARTNERSHIP... HONG KONG: AsiaPay Limited, a leading provider of ePaymentprocessing and security service and solutions in Asia,announced Monday partnership with leading eSecurity solutionleader Softforum. http://www.asiapay.com http://www.softforum.com http://www.paydollar.com ENGINEERING ACQUISITION... TORTONA: The Mossi and Ghisolfi Group (M&G) announced Monday that it has purchased, for an undisclosed amount, Chemtex International Inc. (Chemtex) from Mitsubishi Corporation, acquiring all its engineering, project implementation and business assets. VENTURE CAPITAL... LUND: QlikTech, a game-changing provider of powerful andrapidly deployable business intelligence software solutions,announced Monday that it has raised $12.5 million venturecapital funding. http://www.qliktech.com http://www.jvpvc.com http://www.accel.com BEER MOU... HO CHI MINH CITY: Saigon Beer, Alcohol and BeveragesCorporation (SABECO) and Anheuser-Busch International, Inc.,Sunday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) forcooperation and experience sharing in the beer business. http://www.anheuser-busch.com MULTIMEDIA WEBSITE... TOKYO: Yamaha Corporation has unveiled a website in Chinafor providing multimedia content created using the Syntheticmusic Mobile Application Format (SMAF), a mobile phone contentstandard originated by Yamaha that enables the simultaneousdelivery of sound, graphics, and text. http://www.global.yamaha.com http://hv.smaf-yamaha.com.cn/ http://smaf-yamaha.com/cn/ (AsiaNet is a consortium of leading news agenciesdistributing unedited, translated news releases for worldwideclients. Visit www.asianetnews.net for full-text versions.)