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DoCoMo Does 3G Olympics

WWJ Editors, 16 June 2004
The irony of it all! After taking a 1-trillion-yen ($7.54 billion at the time) charge on overseas investments back in 2002 to seed the world with W-CDMA, DoCoMo today announced that it will set up temporary 3G FOMA base stations in Athens, Greece, from July 30 to September 30, 2004 enabling FOMA subscribers attending the competition to enjoy the service with the same handsets they are currently using in Japan. That’s if the electricity works… and the stadium is built!

Fujitsu's New VoIP/PHS Handset

Fujitsu's New VoIP/PHS HandsetEarlier this week, NTT DoCoMo showcased a prototype 3G/WLAN combination phone carefully configured to make it useless for public hot spots. Against this, Fujitsu Labs and spinoff Net-2Com Corp. have developed something much more useful — a VoIP/PHS phone aimed at the consumer market to be commercialized this fall, with CDMA, GSM, and other versions to follow “depending on market demand.” WWJ treked over to the Fujitsu Solution Forum event in Tokyo recently to have a look at this breakthrough phone; we also took a test ride on Fujitsu Lab’s new PDA unit running a virtual hotspot application that should be coming to reality near you sometime soon.

NEC Introduces 3G Mobile Phone Chip for Rotating TFT Displays

NEC Electronics Corporation and its subsidiary in Europe, NEC Electronics (Europe) GmbH, today introduced the PD161451 bridge IC for 3G mobile handsets, a chip that facilitates development of handsets with rotating high-resolution TFT displays, leveraging the advanced technology of NEC Electronics’ Mobile CMADSTM high-speed serial interface. Recent evolutions in mobile handsets have seen increasing popularity in handset designs with rotating or revolving high resolution thin film transistor (TFT) displays. Compared to previous clamshell designs, the part that connects the display to the main body in these new phones is much narrower, necessitating different design requirements such as a significant reduction in the number of data transmission lines that cross this segment.

Global Industry Leaders to Take Stage At 3GSM Asia

Building on the global success of the world’s leading mobile industry event, the 3GSM World Congress which attracted nearly 30,000 visitors to Cannes last February, the GSM Association & T&F Informa are pleased to announce the 3GSM World Congress Asia. Speakers at the conference, which will be held in Singapore on 29 September to 1 October 2004, include an unprecedented line up of operator CEOs and industry leaders.

Vodafone's FM Handset Launched

Wireless watchers will be aware that the number of FM radio keitai seems to be proliferating. Just this week, KDDI announced that its latest batch of new offerings offer the FM option. Now Vodafone K.K. is tuning into the possibilities with the the V401SA, the carrier’s first handset with a dedicated FM tuner. But does this mean FM will be an optional extra — a bit like having fins on your PDC Cadillac — or will FM become an indispensible, must-have feature for keitai in Japan?

Sony, VeriSign Japan Enter into Alliance for Security FeliCa Card

Under the terms of the alliance, Sony and VeriSign Japan will jointly market Sony’s latest FeliCa card that provides network security using VeriSign’s Managed Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) Service. The network security-enabled card is embedded with Sony’s Dual-interface IC technology, co-developed with Infineon Technologies of Germany, to provide PC users with system authentication and email encryption capabilities.