Year: <span>2005</span>
Year: 2005

Year: 2005

Vodafone Selects A-GPS Solution

Openwave Systems announced that NEC Corp. is integrating Openwave Location Manager into NEC’s Network Assisted Location Information Solutions. Vodafone K.K. in Japan is the first customer to select the combined solution. Openwave and NEC’s location solution is in compliance with the pre-standard Secure User Plane Location (SUPL) standard currently under consideration by the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA). The solution integrates Openwave Location Manager’s Gateway Mobile Location Center (GMLC) with NEC’s SUPL positioning server to provide a high-accuracy, Assisted GPS (A-GPS) offering that enables location-based services for both the consumer and enterprise markets. The combined solution also incorporates an access management feature to protect subscriber privacy at both the mobile handset and application levels.

Vodafone Launches Worldwide Mobile TV

In one of the biggest moves yet to push new mobile TV services to a global audience, Vodafone Group PLC will begin this month to offer a mix of world TV brands, European sports coverage and entertainment programs across its international markets. Under its new global mobile TV channel offering, Vodafone will provide popular programs that are easy to view on small mobile phone screens, the operator said Tuesday.

Note: This story appears to be based on Vodafone Group’s 6 December press release. Big V’s new mobile TV service is, we think, not unrelated to an earlier media service & technology rolled out a year ago and quietly test-marketed in Japan. WWJ hopes to bring you a detailed report shortly once we get confirmation from the carrier. — Ed.

Gadgets, Guards Ensure Kids are Safe

Shock at the brutal murders of two 7-year-old girls in the space of just over a week is pushing Japan to consider everything from bus services to high-tech gadgets to keep small children safe between home and school. High-tech gadgets are an increasingly common way of trying to protect kids unobtrusively. Concerned parents often provide their offspring with mobile phones that incorporate global positioning systems (GPS) for tracking their movements.

FY2005 Mid-Term Demand Forecast for Telecommunication Equipment

CIAJ’s Research and Statistics Committee has compiled its annual mid-term demand forecast. A slowdown in new subscribers pulled the growth rate of cellular handsets down, a break in capital investments by fixed telecommunication carriers decreased demand for modems and central office switching systems, and the transition to multipurpose equipment had a negative impact on facsimiles for business-use. On the other hand, continued healthy growth was seen for business and personal multipurpose equipment, optic communication equipment and routers. Strong interest in security and contingency planning for disasters pushed demand up for fixed communication equipment and other consumer equipment, migration of public PHS users to new carriers, and PHS subscriber growth due to new services contributed to the CIAJ forecast of flat overall growth at 4,138.5 billion yen (negative growth of 0.4% over the previous year) for FY2005. The midterm outlook for the telecommunication equipment market from mid FY2006 onward expects steady market growth, with further migration from 2G to 3G mobile communications, the transition from ADSL to FTTH, the switch to IP, and the lasting popularity of multipurpose equipment.

Bandai Brings Tamagotchi Mobile to EU

Bandai Networks Japan is collaborating with Living Mobile Germany, a European developer and marketer of mobile-phone games, to offer a mobile-phone version of “Tamagotchi” for telecom providers throughout Europe. Bandai created a global craze when it released the hit portable LCD game in 1996, selling 40 million units worldwide. In 2004, the “Tamagotchi Connection” series was released, and has already sold over 15 million units worldwide, the mobile-phone version will be available across Europe beginning in December 2005, according to the company.

Cops Surf Web to Find Killer

Japanese police searching for the killer of a seven-year-old girl are studying internet bulletin board messages boasting of a plan to kidnap a girl after school, a report said on Monday. Newspaper delivery man Kaoru Kobayashi pleaded guilty earlier this year to drowning a kidnapped seven-year-old girl in a bathtub and mutilating her body in a crime he documented in photos that he sent by mobile phone to her mother.