NEC Corporation has signed a framework contract with a leading Polish telecom carrier, Netia, for the supply of it’s advanced, point-to-point wireless access systems, PASOLINK NEO. The new systems will be supplied to the 3G mobile operator P4 the mobile operations arm of Netia SA (“Netia”).
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.
ACCESS has announced that its NetFront Browser and NetFront Messaging Client are featured in the new Sharp 3G handset that Vodafone unveiled on September 10. The 880SH supports both W-CDMA and GSM and is compatible with HSDPA. The handset, developed mainly for the European market, was recently introduced as part of Vodafone’s Christmas 2007 lineup.
According to Social Computing Magazine, Excite Japan announced the UK release of its ad-funded mobile social networking service, mobikade. Mobikade provides personal mobile space allowing users to post updates and download a wide variety of mainly puzzle games such as Sudoku, all for free. Currently, mobikade provides 20 games and plans to add 3 to 5 games monthly.
Following this press release on March 15, which indicated that DoCoMo would introduce a new 3G handset developed with award-winning designer Stefano Giovannoni, the company has announced the N904i, produced by NEC, will make its world debut during Milan’s celebrated Design Week. The exhibition will take place at Superstudio Più in Zona Tortona, a popular area of the city.
According to a recent research report by Forrester, when it comes to mobile services, Japan is still ahead of Europe by a whopping five years, even though operators in both regions introduced mobile Internet services at roughly the same time in the late 1990s. So it’s no wonder that Europe’s mobile operators and content and media firms wanting to enter the mobile channel look at the Japanese market to try to predict the future success — or lack thereof — of new mobile Internet services. European mobile operators should focus on the needs of mobile users on the go: their desire to communicate and access to timely and location-relevant content.
[“..focus on the needs of mobile users..” what a great concept — Eds]
