Nissan is harnessing the power of the AvantGo(R) mobile Internet service to extend its “Shift_” campaign to mobile and wireless devices. Nissan has launched a pioneering affinity marketing campaign for the Nissan 2004 Maxima called the “Mobile Concierge” that packages advertising for the new car with compelling entertainment content for consumers.
Battery technology has improved significantly over the last 20 years or so. And this has enabled some wonderful gadgets and tools including mobile phones and PDAs to become practical and usable devices. Enter micro fuel cells. This technology, being developed by literally dozens of companies in the United States, Japan and Europe, promises to deliver a fivefold or more increase in power for small, portable devices.
In an effective snub to top handset maker Nokia, the Financial Times reported that Vodafone was negotiating exclusive deals with Japan’s Sanyo and Samsung of South Korea for its new range of upgraded Vodafone Live! multimedia phones. ‘Vodafone is trialling a number of handsets to support its 3G service, which will be available before March 2004,’ the group stated. ‘Vodafone cannot confirm at this stage which manufacturers will be exclusive providers for Vodafone’s 3G services.’
Mobile phones, it turns out, are susceptible to attack, as clever hackers have shown in recent years. Not all mobile phones are built the same way, which makes them more resistant to widespread attack than PCs. But operators with a strong economic incentive to sell more than just voice services are pushing phone makers to add more processing capability. Often this is done by adding an applications processor, which creates an opening for would-be hackers.
Hitachi is to bring a WLAN-based positioning system to market in Japan next month. The rig uses Wi-Fi technology to triangulate the location of network clients to within one and three metres – accurate enough to detect whether a user is within the building the network serves.
Conventional wisdom teaches that Japan’s mobile industry is at least 18 months in front of Europe (and years ahead of the US). That truism is no more, however, as Europe’s cellular carriers, handset makers, and wireless Internet content providers have sweated blood to catch up – and catch up they have indeed. Daniel Scuka is in Germany this fall where he’s helping WWJpartner
Last week the major wireless players in Japan converged in Tokyo’s trendy Aoyamadistrict to discuss future mobile content development strategies, and we were there see DoCoMo’s director for i-mode Takeshi Natsuno and KDDI’s contents general manager Makoto Takahashi keynote speeches. We also sat down to chat with infoPLANT’s V.P and Chief Development Officer, Susumu Taniuchi, about their new camera-phone based marketing research business. With so much potential and controversy surrounding the ketai cams we were impressed to see how a traditional business model can evolve by adopting these new tools and technologies. Full Program Run-time 14:50
Taito Corp, a Japanese game software developer, and Finland’s mobile communications company, Nokia Corp, announced on Aug 28 a plan for joint presentation of a karaoke application to be used on cell phones in Asia. Taito will offer an application using its karaoke data format, “Sequential Display Object Format” (SDOF) for Nokia’s GSM-compatible mobile phone “Nokia 3300.”
DoCoMo announced today that from September 6, 2003 the service area for DoCoMo’s FOMA(R) third-generation (3G) mobile phones will cover 99% of the population in the Kanto-Koshinetsu region. Its eight regional subsidiaries will also expand the FOMA service area to 96% of the population nationwide by the end of September.
KDDI has announced a contract with Hutchison CAT Wireless Multimedia Ltd., a leading cellular phone carrier in Thailand, for the construction of a high-precision global positioning system (GPS). The contract is based on the gpsOne system which KDDI presently offers in Japan in cooperation with NEC as EZ NAVI, and is worth a total of approximately 1 billion yen. In constructing the new system, KDDI will cooperate with Snap Track, Inc., regarding the gpsOne system license and technological support.
