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editors

Is America Ready for a Virtual Mobile?

American Venture magazine interviewed Scott Driggers, CEO and Co-Founder of Gemini Mobile Technologies, about whether the American market is ready to explore a virtual world on their cell phone. Gemini is preparing to launch its 3D mobile software platform, eXplo, in the UK or the U.S. Currently, eXplo is driving Softbank Mobile’s 3D virtual world, S! Town, in Japan, which has added 100,000 subscribers since launching in November of 2006. In S! Town, subscribers design and dress their avatar and room, using the virtual world’s currency for purchases.

Namco and KDDI Partner for Mobile Games

Namco Networks has announced an exclusive partnership with KDDI to represent the carriers large catalog of mobile games from Japanese publishers and developers in North American. Running on Qualcomms BREW technology, KDDI has a mobile games catalog which includes a wide range of puzzle, action and strategy games. Financial details of the venture were not included with the statement.

Softbank to Launch 3G handsets in Taiwan

Via this post on DigiTimes; Panasia Media Corporation (PMC), a subsidiary of Japan-based Softbank, plans to introduce 3G handsets built with Softbank’s platform in Taiwan in the third quarter of this year, according to Alex Chuan, PMC chairman and Softbank’s representative in Taiwan. PMC will team up with Chunghwa Telecom (CHT) to market Softbank-based 3G handsets under the CHT trade name for a suggested retail price of about NT$20,000 (US$606), Chuan indicated.

KDDI Aquires Stake in Acrodea

According to a report on Market Watch, KDDI aims to buy 4,300 shares of Acrodea Inc. , or a 6.6% stake in the handset-use software developer, through markets by the end of April. The value of the share purchase will be around Y11 billion, based on Wednesday’s closing price of Acrodea shares at Y248,000. KDDI said in a press release it seeks to strengthen ties with Acrodea in developing [applications for] mobile phone handsets.

DoCoMo Tops Mobile Operator Rankings

DoCoMo and Vodafone have been assessed by ABI Research as occupying the “sweet spot” of “Market Innovation and Market Implementation,” in their latest Mobile Operator Performance Matrix, with high ratings on a range of indicators: CAPEX spend per user; non-voice revenue contribution; number and utility of applications and service deployments; EBITDA; share of the global subscriber market; and EBITDA margin.