Fujitsu Reports Issue With Sony Laptop Battery

Fujitsu says a user of one its laptop personal computers had problems last week with a Sony-made battery.

The problems occurred on the evening of Oct. 24 when the user said sparks came from the battery pack. The user disconnected the laptop from the electric supply and detached the battery pack, said Toshiaki Koike, a spokesman for Fujitsu in Tokyo. The user was not injured during the incident, said Fujitsu.

Fujitsu began offering users of certain laptop models the chance to get a replacement battery in early October as part of Sony’s global battery replacement program. The laptop in question was one of those covered by the replacement program, said Koike.

The offer stopped short of a recall because Fujitsu didn’t believe there was a danger from using the batteries, which were produced during the same time as batteries recalled by other laptop makers including Dell and Apple Computer. Those recalls began after incidents in which the batteries caught fire, and Sony said it was due to a combination of problems that occurred during manufacturing and the system configuration of the laptops in question.

The battery recalls and replacements are expected to cover 9.6 million batteries and cost Sony up to 51.2 billion yen (US$436 million).

–Martyn Williams, IDG News Service (Tokyo Bureau)

Related Links:

• Sony Battery Recalls: Who’s Next?

• Toshiba, Hitachi, Fujitsu May Ask for Sony Battery Compensation

• Fujitsu to Recall 287K Sony-Made Batteries

• Sony Opens Up on Battery Recall

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