Dell, Sony have known battery problems nearly a year ago

Dell and Sony have known Lithium-Ion batteries manufactured by Sony with problems for nearly a year.

However, the two companies decided not to recall the product at the time and led to the faulty battery product that has been burning recently.

These are the information confirmed by Rick Clancy - Sony Electronics spokesman - over the weekend.

Rick Clancy said that Dell and Sony had discussions in October 2005 and that discussions were resumed in February 2006. As discussed in these discussions, it is a matter of small amounts of metal that exist in Lithium-Ion batteries manufactured by Sony. Only a small amount of metal can cause the battery to overheat and burn.

The results of those discussions were that Sony had to change its production line to minimize the amount of metal that exists in Lithium-Ion batteries. Besides, the two companies also decided not to recall faulty batteries that were marketed because those batteries were not really dangerous.

" We have not fully confirmed the dangers of these batteries until recently. We received notices about incidents but did not know if there were any environmental factors that directly affected those. We have taken the necessary steps to ensure the smallest possible amount of metal in battery products , "Clancy asserted.

Meanwhile, Dell spokeswoman Anne Camden declined to comment on discussions with Sony in October 2005 and February 2006. However, Ms. Camden also said that Dell believed Sony had changed its production line to solve the problem. Dell's goal now is to overcome the consequences and make sure no similar cases occur.

Dell said it had received announcements about the case of laptop products becoming too hot during operations a few years ago. In December 2005, Dell and the US Consumer Product Safety Commission also had to recall more than 22,000 laptop batteries because these products were often too hot during operation. The amount of metal is the cause of these cases.

And this time Dell had to recall more than 4 million batteries used in its laptop products. Sony was also responsible for this recall. Every Sony battery product will be further investigated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

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