The Japan communications ministry said Monday it will put into practical use this fall the ultra wideband wireless system that enables indoor data transmission at five times the speed of the fiber-optic communication system. With a transmission speed of up to 500 megabits per second, the system will allow the recording of more than two high-definition television programs at the same time, the ministry said.
According to a press release from KDDI/au today, the company has just announced a new handset, the W43T [.jpg] from Toshiba. Also just announced: this Toshiba unit will incorporate the company’s new 3D Navi GPS service functions and that both will be introduced to the market starting in late April. This latest CDMA-1X unit also offers LISMO mobile music and touts a 3.2-megapixel camera, although it does not have a 4GB HDD, like the recent W41T, or the mobile commerce ‘FeliCa’ chip.
Here’s a quick video clip we shot at the Vodafone press conference when they introduced the new V804SS handset by Samsung — the first Samsung handset in Japan — going on sale here finally today. It has a few up-close examples of the company’s new dynamic email application, “Deru Moji” 3D Pictogram Display with pop-up animations, that we thought were pretty interesting.
While the functionality is only interoperable between a few handsets so far, this is a mobile mail nation and ‘cool factor’ really does count. Look for more discussion online about this next-gen offering — centered on when will it hit EU and US markets. Remember you saw it here first on WWJ!
Usen Corp. plans to begin a free video distribution service for cellular phones on March 27, with the goal of attracting 3 million registered users in the initial year. Videos, each lasting no more than five minutes or so, will be transmitted to users of 3G-handsets that support video and high-speed data communications functions once they register their personal information, including ZIP codes, sex and email addresses. No fees will be charged, but four short commercials will be inserted into each programme.
This week marked a major milestone for WWJ! In one form or another, I’ve been writing this email newsletter for five years — and what a five year term it’s been!
I spent a couple hours last night looking over past WWJ newsletters, and was struck by how much Japan’s mobile scene has changed. In 2001, when I started writing a weekly mobile-focused newsletter for J@pan Inc, i-mode had just celebrated its second birthday, KDDI had yet to roll out CDMA 1X services and the No. 3 competitor in the market was known as “J-Phone.”
Today, DoCoMo is far in the lead with their 3G FOMA service and music and TV are the new hot trends; i-mode itself has become almost dasai (uncool). KDDI have created one of the mightiest and most unified mobile platforms on Earth, with GPS-based blogging, shopping and PC Internet integration drawing huge usage. The company formerly known as J-Phone is about to become the company formerly known as Vodafone as Masayoshi Son attacks 3G mobile with the same successful discount focus with which he attacked NTT and home broadband.
Bonus ‘those were the days’ tidbits via the WWJ Newsletter after the jump!
Vodafone Japan just announced that on 25 March 2006 it will commence nationwide sales of the Vodafone 804SS, a new 3G handset by Samsung Electronics. The V804SS represents Samsung’s first mobile phone for the Japanese market and is touted as the world’s thinnest clamshell 3G handset, measuring just 14.9mm and weighs only 98g. Users can view PDF, Microsoft Word and other file types on the handset, it also supports PC Link and has a full-fledged music player functions with external controls.
KDDI and TV Asahi have just announced they will co-op on experimental television program synchronization services targeted for mobile digital broadcasting. TV Asahi has production and the broadcast distribution knowhow and KDDI has a large-scale interactive program with a well developed platform of mobile users. The companies established this new joint-venture to explore next generation applications, contents and services enabled by combining communication and broadcasting techologies.
According to a story in the Daily Yomiuri, NEC’s next president Kaoru Yano told a recent press conference that “It’s bizarre that there are more than 10 cell phone makers in Japan. We’ll definitely go for a tie-up”, showing his enthusiasm for a rearrangement plan. Following the Nokia-Sanyo announcement and as mentioned in our Predictions for 2006, we are not surprised to hear about his plans for consolidation in the Japanese OEM market.
According to an article on EE Times, during talks that led to Softbank’s acquisition of Vodafone’s Japan unit, the companies also agreed to form a joint venture to deliver data services. The joint venture will be the base of Softbank’s Internet service that will leverage Vodafone’s mobile phone network. The combined effort will challenge NTT DoCoMo’s i-mode service, said Masayoshi Son, president and CEO of Softbank.
Via on What Japan Thinks, japan.internet.com and JR Tokai Express Research recently conducted a survey to find out about “meiwaku” mail (spam). They interviewed 330 mobile-phone owners, 60 percent male, from all around the country by means of an internet-based survey. 19.9 percent of respondents received at least 1 spam mail per day.
