Philips to fix 12,000 plasma TVs in US

Dutch company Philips Electronics will make house calls to repair almost 12,000 flat panel plasma TV sets in the United States because they are liable to overheating, it said over the weekend.

Several incidents of overheating have been reported in the United States but Philips said materials used in the television sets were all flame retardant and there was no risk that they would catch fire.

"As a precaution we'll go to the consumers and replace the component. There's no fire risk," a Philips spokesman said.

He declined to say how much the house calls would cost the company. Philips would approach consumers individually and had not issued a press release. The problem occurred in 127 centimetres sets. It is restricted to the United States, because the faulty capacitors involved are used only in the assembly lines for the US market.

Philips last week confirmed to Reuters that it could not meet demand for its flagship liquid crystal display (LCD) flat TV sets, due to production problems involving high-quality display panels from its key supplier LG.Philips LCD.

It said it expected supply would meet demand in April.

LCD and plasma are different technologies and are the two main flat displays systems used in thin television sets.

Philips is the world's biggest lighting maker, a top three hospital equipment maker, Europe's biggest consumer electronics producer and the region's number three in semiconductors.