Sony supposedly paid Warner Brothers $400 million to drop HD-DVD and go with Blu-Ray. Now there are some signs that maybe Toshiba had other interests in mind when they conceded the HD battle.

Reuters is reporting that Sony has agreed to sell its microchip production plants in Japan to Toshiba for $835 million. The plants will be used by a Sony/Toshiba joint venture to manufacture high-performance Cell chips and RSX graphic chips used in the PlayStation 3. Other chips will also be made there that go into Toshiba products.

Sony announced in October that it would sell the facilities to Toshiba, but the price has been unavailable until now — after Toshiba quit the HD movie market.

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