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DoCoMo has announced that beginning December 1st it will reduce the monthly maximum charge for wireless data charged by tethering a handset with PC or other device under their Pake-hodai double flat-rate data service to 5,985 yen, down from 13,650 yen (from approx. $150 to $65), via selected Internet access points.

DoCoMo Europe rolls i-channel with latest news of Japan, news related to Europe, sports and entertainment info. [JPN]

The guys at GMAP have been working very hard over the past few months to develop a new iPhone app., called Go!TOKYO, targeted at people either living or visiting here should find rather useful. Designed with English speakers in mind, it was created to help get folks around the maze of subway platforms and guide you through to puzzling locations, using the companies exisiting database of great maps, most often to be found 'somewhere' near a metro stop. For a whole 350jpy (about $4) on iTunes this one is a no-brainer!

Wavesat announced that its "Odyssey" chipset is the first, and currently the only, to be widely deployed in Willcom's new "XGP" broadband wireless network, which entered commercial service this month in Japan. Willcom's data-only XGP service, based on a 4G "OFDMA" standard, is available to the general public and enterprise users. The 4G multi-core architecture incorporates multiple ultra low power DSPs, offering flexibility, high performance and low power consumption. The SOC manufactured using advanced Embedded DRAM technology requires no external memory, thus saving customers power consumption for very small form-factor. The Odyssey chipset is featured in Willcom’s GX001N XGP PC Cards manufactured by NEC.

The 9th annual Mobidec conference and trade show event -- Nov. 25th -- in Tokyo [Jpn] Details after the jump>>

DoCoMo released disappointing 1H financial results FY2009, includes revision of full year forecast. PDF in English.

Fujitsu Joins the Symbian Board of Directors bringing a wealth of knowledge and expertise in the open source community.

The Mobile Computing Promotion Consortium will hold their annual conference and trade-show in Tokyo on Nov. 27th [JPN]

DeNA snags IceBreaker Co. with plans merge MobaMingle into Crush or Flush. Press Release [JPN]

While blitzing through the typhoon from one meeting to another along the JR Yamanote lines yesterday afternoon we stumbled across this groovy installation by Mediacure on the platform. Promoting the latest hot drink sensation - CoCo Presso, basically Hot CoCo flavored espresso - which has also been running what would have to be a rather expensive TV ad campaign. Mildly interested, and certainly in need of a hot shot of something, upon entering the booth it was clear they were using the FeliCa tap & go call-to-action, note reader embedded beside the LCD screen on the last photo. Sure enough it loaded a crisp Flash mobile website offering a coupon for a quick discount on the product via the co-located vending machine, which of course is also NFC-enabled. The entire sequence of snapping the pix below and grabbing a jolt of sweet caffeine took like 90-seconds before our next train came