Year: <span>2004</span>
Year: 2004

Year: 2004

Japan Mobile Video Evolution

Japan Mobile Video Evolution“Always in motion, the future is,” says Master Yoda – and your faithful Jedi knights at WWJ just got a lesson on what’s coming out for mobile phones here this summer. Conventional H.264 video compression requires a large volume of arithmetic operations, and additional components such as H.264-dedicated LSI application processors (essentially a high-speed digital signal processing chip). However, when a H.264/MPEG-4 AVC codec meets a super algorithm that boosts on-chip processing, the result is super-clear video with less demand on battery power. “Algorithm Specialist” Techno Mathematical Co., Ltd., has just released its Digital Media New Algorithm (DMNA) and today’s program takes a look at the results. Full Program Run-time 13:10

Huawei 3G – Made in China

According to Huawei spokesman Fu Jun, Huawei has already begun producing handsets for use with mobile systems that use the CDMA-1X standard backed by US-based Qualcomm Corp. Fu said Huawei is also developing handsets for W-CDMA, which is the European standard Hong Kong’s Hutchison Whampoa Ltd is using in its 3G service now on offer in Britain and Italy. He added new 3G handsets are being designed in various partnerships with Matsushita Electric Industrial Co’s Panasonic, NEC Corp and Infineon Technologies AG. The company made headlines in December when it signed agreements with Emirates Telecommunications Corp and Hong Kong’s Sunday on the deployment of W-CDMA networks for the two telecom operators.

H.264 to Displace MPEG Video

A new video encoding method nicknamed the “mammoth Codec” is attracting the attention of engineers in a wide range of equipment development sectors. The primary reason is the high data compression ratio, significantly better than that offered by existing Phase 2 (MPEG-2) or MPEG-4 Visual schemes. Many authorities working on international standards for encoding technology feel that little further improvement can be expected in the compression ratio, making the new technique a trump card that closes out the current series of MPEG-based Codecs, which began with MPEG-1.

Vodafone's New Shibuya Megastore

Vodafone's New Shibuya MegastoreOn April 1, Vodafone Japan opened its 5-floor, 890-square-meter flagship megastore in Shibuya and we were there to cover the event and take a peak at some of the goodies on hand. Japan Wireless Watchers will know that Shibuya makes or breaks fashions for Japan’s youth market, and i-mode is commonly said to have been popularized in Shibuya. For Vodafone, the new store is part of a public relations blitz to complete the rebranding of J-Phone amongst Japan’s vital teens and tweens market ahead of a big 3G terminal push later in the year. We were a bit disappointed that Vodafone didn’t have anything really new on offer in terms of new services or handsets to coincide with the big opening, but as a rebranding tool the store — located centrally on one of Shibuya’s main drags — is probably worth a thousand billboards. Full Program Run-time 6:04

DoCoMo W-CDMA FOMA Adds 0.72 Million

FOMA is finally flying for NTT DoCoMo, with the 900i series proving a huge hit. Last week DoCoMo announced that its 3G subsriber base had topped three million and the figures in from Japan’s Telecommunication Carriers Association show that for the first time in over half a year DoCoMo is punching toe-to-toe with KDDI for new subscribers. In fact, it was a very close call; for March 2004 DoCoMo raked in 723,800 new 3G adds against Au Group’s 742,800. The point: The 900is are living up to the hype.

Vodafone Unveils First TV/ Radio Mobile Phone

Vodafone strikes back! Those of you who have read this week’s Viewpoint will know that Toshiba is running silent and deep on its digital TV tuner mobile phones…but meantime they’ve come up with Japan’s first TV/ Radio phone for…Vodafone! Wow! The V401T beats NEC’s groundbreaking V601N, Japan’s first TV mobile phone, in several important areas. First; the 2.2 inch screen is upgraded to QVGA; second, the V401T is also capable of 12 minutes of program recording time; and third of course, there is the radio…They’ve actually gone and done it. Cool!!!… And now the caveats…

Shazam – Name that Ringtone

SystemK announced April 1 that a filed test of Shazam, a music recognition service developed by Shazam Entertainment of London, ended in great success. By simply pointing a cellphone toward any music for 30 seconds, the user can find out the name and the singer of the tune.

E-Learning on the Move

“The only device that’s really handy enough to let you study where, and when, you want is the cellular phone,” says Junko Ogawa, mobile-Internet content producer for Tokyo language-textbook publishing company, ALC Press. Streamlined study, testing and reference sites are used by everyone, from the salaryman hoping to cram in a little English vocabulary during his morning commute, to the high school student with five minutes to spare for brushing up on a few Chinese kanji characters.

Mobile TV Solution Coming?

On top of launching full-scale digital-satellite-to-mobile-terminal broadcasting services on July 1, Mobile Broadcasting Corp. (MBCO) and its main technology backer Toshiba Corp. are making a strong, and they believe attractive, push to generate digital broadcasting revenue streams for Japan’s wireless carriers in April 2006 when DoCoMo, KDDI, and perhaps Vodafone K.K. will unleash mobiles with digital TV tuners on them. Talking to Shigekazu Hori, vice president and general manger of Toshiba Corp.’s Network Services & Contents Control Center last week, the planets could finally be aligning for a tailor-made revenue model that will finally convince Japan’s carriers to equip mobile phones with television. And, of course, as mentioned by DoCoMo’s Keiji Tachikawa last week, the fact that MPEG-4 standards have been settled and H.264 is coming doesn’t hurt either.

Embedded Linux for New Archos PDA

Archos will ship at the end of 2004 a portable audio/video device rumored to be based on embedded Linux. Cebit attendees report that the as-yet unnamed device was spotted running Qtopia, a PDA app stack from Trolltech currently available only for embedded Linux. The device will support networking through Ethernet, WiFi, Bluetooth, modem and GSM add-on cards.