KDDI raised 80 billion yen ($728 million) in its first bond sale in two years, according to this article on Bloomberg. The company sold 20 billion yen of 1.5 percent seven-year bonds to yield 38 basis points more than Japanese government securities, Daiwa SMBC and Mizuho Securities handled the sale.
Alcatel-Lucent announced it has been selected by Softbank Mobile to supply a mobile backhaul solution to help the operator meet rapidly increasing subscriber demand for 3G services on Softbank’s mobile network. The solution includes Alcatel-Lucent’s 7670 Routing Switch Platform and the 5620 Network Management platform.
KTF and DoCoMo announced that they have agreed to jointly invest in U Mobile Sdn Bhd, a new Malaysian 3G mobile operator that is scheduled to launch commercial service in 2008. The two companies will collectively acquire 33 percent control of the new market entrant.
Only those who have been totally blocked-out from all media sources over the last year would wonder what an iPhone is as the so-called “Jesus Phone” has been in the mainstream headlines since even before it was officially unveiled in January. However, for a combination of reasons, there has only been mild speculation about when – or indeed how – it would become available in the Japanese market. Citing the initial lack of 3G capability, not too mention an ‘unusual’ operator revenue share arrangement, the story so far has centered around deployments in the US and Europe. Full skinny after the jump!
NTT DoCoMo just announced that DoCoMo Europe (France) S.A.S., a wholly owned subsidiary of DoCoMo Europe Ltd., will be closed at the end of this year and a representative office in Paris will be established in January 2008. With the main role of the subsidiary now reduced to the monitoring of the European telecom industry, DoCoMo has decided to replace it with a representative office that will liaise in matters related to DoCoMo’s business interests in Europe.
NXP, founded by Philips, and Sony Corporation have announced the formation of Moversa, a joint venture to drive global adoption of contactless smart card applications in mobile phones using Near Field Communication (NFC). Moversa will plan, develop, produce and market a secure chip, a Universal Secure Access Module (U-SAM), that incorporates both MIFARE and FeliCa operating systems and applications. The U-SAM will also support other contactless operating systems and applications based on customer requirements. Moversa will be led by co-presidents Guus Frericks of NXP and Toshio Yoshihara of Sony.
