Strange Mobile Tech News from Japan
Well.. it’s not like we woke-up on the wrong side of the futon.. but srsly..?!? Those who have followed us over the years know we’re not generally shy to wave a pointed stick when duty calls.. and there have been a few lately.
Surely Sharp has more important things to do, all considered, these days. While it’s likely geeky cool Google juice for tech sites overseas that delight in the bizarre Japan meme, and Panasonic has been spending heavy in the Smart APPliance space as well, somehow remote controlling the vacuum only appeals about as far as chasing miss kitty around the house while we’re stuck on the train in crush-hour.
Also landing in our impromptu kangaroo court is none other than DoCoMo with this painfully awkward attempt to seem chick-cool, apologies to the clearly talented and energetic ‘producers’ this is not aimed at you. Choosing the trendy Harajuku location, where both KDDI and Softbank have significant investments, was logical and even the cozy boutique feel alternative is fine as far as it goes. But.. we are talking about DoCoMo, going after the teen girls segment – already a challenge – with near zero resources on the table for a fistfight in the new smartphone customer space, see the YoY growth in that demographic Basically bringing bananas instead of rocket launchers.
Meanwhile, a gut feeling after a few recon hours on the retail front scoping current new handset offerings. Clearly the latest Samsung Galaxy series is the kit to beat with both DoCoMo and KDDI, strangely it’s not available from SoftBank, pushing pretty juicy MNP incentives (read: Free device) to sign a 2-year contract. It will be real interesting to see the official TCA new subscriber stats for November.
Otherwise, as always, plenty of actually interesting news posted on via the Archive. Hat-tip to the folks over at Keitai Watch for their detailed coverage [Jpn] of the annual DoCoMo Disaster Drill held for the first time since the 3.11 earthquake. They apparently incorporated some lessons learned from that tragic event and we are thankful for the fine efforts of so many people involved with this most important work.