Nortel and Toshiba have announced an agreement for the joint development of mobile WiMax base stations for Japanese and global markets. In Japan, Nortel and Toshiba jointly participated in the government’s next-generation wireless trial using WiMax solutions, and successfully completed trial service provision in the Tohoku region of northern Japan between December 2006 to March 2007.
According to reports coming out of the Japanese media it appears that the communications ministry is leaning towards granting new spectrum licenses to Acca Networks Co. and Willcom Inc. to the predictable surprise and disappointment of the four existing operators. In an apparent effort to encourage more competition the ministry plans to allocate frequency by this autumn and expects the new services using the 2.5-gigahertz frequency band to start within three years after the licenses are granted.
According to this report on Reuters, EAccess plans to sell some of its stake in the newly launched eMobile unit to Goldman Sachs. The share sale would also see the firm change from a consolidated subsidiary of EAccess into an affiliate thus reducing losses the parent company would be required to book in group earnings. Emobile also appointed CFO Eric Gan as president and chief operating officer, having been managing director of Goldman before founding the telecom operator.
Shares of Casio Computer Co. fell the most in 32 years after the company missed its profit target and unveiled plans to expand in the crowded mobile-phone market. The stock tumbled by the 400-yen daily limit, or 16 percent, to 2,025 yen in Tokyo, erasing $931 million from its market value. Brokerages including HSBC Holdings Plc downgraded the stock after the company reported annual profit of 25.1 billion yen ($209 million), missing its own estimate by 9 percent.
Boingo Wireless announced a roaming agreement with livedoor Co. Ltd., to add the company’s central Tokyo Wi-Fi network to their 60,000 global hotspot collection. This agreement marks the second Asian hot zone to join the Boingo Roaming System the first was citywide WIFLY network in Taipei, which added in July 2006. According to the press release livedoor’s network covers 80% of the outdoor area located within the Yamanote Line with thousands of power-pole mounted access points.
Softbank Corp. announced their FYE 2006 results yesterday indicating that the parent companies fourth-quarter operating profit more than doubled YoY after buying Vodafone mobile-phone unit last spring. The entire presentation video is available in English Here. The 1.66 trillion yen acquisition made Softbank the second-fastest growing company in sales terms on the Nikkei 225 Stock Average for the fiscal first half ended Sept. 30. Operating profit rose to 73.8 billion yen ($615 million) in the three months ended March 31 from 34.4 billion yen in Q4 2005, while sales more than doubled to 721.9 billion yen from 298.4 billion yen, according to Bloomberg.
SoftBank Mobile has announced that the number of subscriptions for the companies “While Plan” has exceeded four million on May 3, 2007. Originally introduced in early January, this simple price package offers a monthly basic charge of ¥980 with free domestic voice calls between SoftBank Mobile users from 1:00 to 21:00, and for domestic voice calls other than those it charges a tariff of 21 yen/30 sec. In addition, text messaging between 3G users is, with some restrictions, free of charge.
According to this article on the Yomiuri, plans to launch a satellite to create an emergency cell phone relay station in space were announced by the Japanese Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry last week. The stationary orbital satellite with an antenna more than twice the size of any existing satellite antenna, would be used to secure mobile phone connections when ground base relay stations have been knocked out in an earthquake or other natural disasters. The ministry hopes to have the system running by the end of fiscal 2015.
DoCoMo just announced that subscribers to their flat-rate data communication billing plans “pake-hodai” and “pake-hodai full” surpassed the 10 million mark on May 1, 2007. The pake-hodai plan, launched on June 1, 2004, allows 3G FOMA i-mode subscribers unlimited viewing of i-mode content for a flat monthly subscription fee of 4,095 yen (including tax). The pake-hodai full plan, introduced on March 1, 2007, enables subscribers with full-browser handsets to view not only i-mode sites but also browse PC websites for a flat monthly subscription fee of 5,985 yen (including tax). Neither plan applies to data surfing using connected devices, such as PCs, and cannot be used outside Japan.
KDDI and Mitsubishi-Tokyo-UFJ Bank have jointly established the Mobile Net Bank Development Corp. in preparation for the two companies to launch their mobile ‘New Bank’. The entity has since been formalizing the business plan, finalizing products and services, and building the required core systems for the New Bank. Subject to approval from the appropriate authorities, KDDI, Mitsubishi-Tokyo-UFJ, and Mobile Net Bank have now agreed on the line-up of products and services and the commercial time frame for launch, which is scheduled to open midway through this financial year.
