NTT DoCoMo, Inc. and its eight regional subsidiaries announced today a new 2G/3G service, called “i-mode My Box,” for easy linkage to customized web pages via “iMenu,” the official i-mode portal. The service will be launched on a trial basis beginning at 9:00 a.m. on June 2, 2003.
One of the little-reported stories from Japan’s wireless webs is how companies big and small are using mobile for marketing, sales support, and CRM. Today, WWJ goes behind the scenes for a never-before-seen preview of the Java-based m-marketing system built for major auto maker GM’s Opel brand by Tokyo-based BeTrend Corp. Based on a custom version of BeTrend’s BeatCast engine and due to launch next month, the system provides customer support, sales and marketing information – and cool pics of the newest cars. Japan mobile at its most sophisticated – and sublime!
Disney Internet Group is not expecting its US operations to approach its success in Japan anytime in the near future, one of their executives told me. The guess here is that things will change when color phones saturate the market. One in every three cell phones in the US will have a color display within 6 months, according to Seamus McAteer at Zelos Group, a San Francisco-based technology consulting firm.
Infoplant Co., Ltd., an Internet research company, said DoCoMo’s i-mode users mostly bookmark and view sites that provide ring melodies and wallpaper images, and least favor mobile banking and trading sites. Infoplant conducted a survey from Feb. 24 to March 3, 2003 on the usage of Internet sites registered under the i-menu.
After all the trashing Western skeptics have done on Japan’s non-exportable cartoonish content, Hello Kitty content is coming to AT&T Wireless’s mMode! I guess it makes sense, it is a very recognized Japanese brand here; I think most people don’t even know that it’s Japanese actually.
Last week, sr. contributing editor Michael Thuresson sent in a user-level review of his new Sanyo handset that he uses on the Sprint network. As you scroll through a list of tones, you cannot sample them before you buy them. Hard for people new to this idea to get interested if they can’t do that!
