Cute is a way of life for the Japanese regardless of age — and occasionally gender. Rather like George Lucas’ The Force, it permeates all life, binding consumer and corporate galaxies together. The undeniable mistress of power in this universe is Sanrio’s Hello Kitty. It was inevitable that Kitty would join in a fearful synchronicity of marketing with Apple to create a limited-edition Hello Kitty iPod mini.
KDDI have updated their Service Subscribers data for the month of February, including latest subscriber figures for KDDI/au, Tu-Ka and DION. Access updated pages Here.
WWJ’s director of digital media Lawrence Cosh-Ishii was on the platform at JR Ebisu station on Tokyo’s Yamanote circle line earlier today and spotted a new ad for Vodafone’s V603T (from Toshiba). The Toshiba model and its partner, the V603SH (Sharp), released in February, both feature much-improved analog TV and FM radio functionality and the Sharp model has a built in 3D motion sensor. The ad campaign and the new cellys highlight Vodafone’s continued development of cutting-edge 2G models.
Ten of Japan’s telecom hardware and communication LSI makers recently announced plans to establish the ZigBee SIG Japan (ZigBee SIG-J) in the summer of 2005. ZigBee SIG-J will be a non-profit organization aimed at promoting the use of the ZigBee short-distance wireless standard. Given Japan’s traditional strength in the design and manufacture of control systems, this could be a hint of big things to come.
Vodafone Group, the world’s largest cellphone company by sales, will use its experience with high-speed wireless services in Japan to stay ahead of competitors in less advanced markets, said Shiro Tsuda, who runs the Japanese unit. “Japan is way ahead in 3G,” Tsuda, president of Vodafone K.K., said in an interview Friday.
DoCoMo announced today that the companies will stop accepting new applications for “Pre-Call®” prepaid mobile phones on March 31, 2005. From April, the company will suggest to users that they subscribe to alternative services, such as mobile phone rental services or “Limit Plus,” which enables users to limit monthly charges. DoCoMo launched the Pre-Call service in May 1999. The number of subscribers peaked at about 210,000 in March 2001, after which the number began decreasing. About 80,000 customers were using the service as of January 2005.
When cellphones began to spread among teenagers in the late 1990s, it became something of a teacher’s nightmare, and nowhere more so than in rules-oriented Japan. Mobile phones were immediately banned, but students’ enthusiasm could not be contained: phones went off in the middle of classes, students relayed emails to friends all day long, and cheating using the phone during exams became pervasive. But recently, there has been a change of heart among some Japanese educators. In fact, some teachers at universities and high schools are requiring that their pupils show up in class with a mobile phone.
KDDI has posted their January subscriber data on the company’s IR website. CDMA 1X subscribers grew by 286,000; cdmaOne shrank by 122,300. Assuming a 100 percent migration rate, this indicates that the carrier picked up 163,700 new customers. It will be interesting to see how the other two compare when the official TCA numbers come out later this week.
Reuters is reporting that Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. (NTT), the world’s biggest telecoms group by revenue, posted a solid operating profit for the first nine months of its business year, despite intense competition. While the group’s fixed-line business may be struggling, the mobile arm is doing rather well, thank you very much.
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., the world’s largest consumer-electronics maker, said third-quarter profit rose 47 percent on lower costs and flat-screen television sales. The company will cut 7,000 to 8,000 jobs in Japan in its components and mobile phone units by March 31, it said. Matsushita Electric has 340,000 employees, more than double Sony’s, according to Bloomberg data.
