Holy crap this is going to result in an enormous drive manufacturing company. I guess they're making this move somewhat 'in response' to the recent Toshiba-Samsung merger, but I definitely didn't expect something this dramatic.

"Sony Corp. and NEC Corp. signed Thursday (Nov. 17) a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that they would establish a joint venture company in the optical disk drive business, aiming to be the top optical disk drive manufacturer in the world. The as yet unnamed company is due to start operations with the financial year on April 1 next year."