Japan Market
Japan Market

Japan Market

Japan Handsets Technology Isn't Everything

Japanese companies have a technology edge derived from digital media expertise, and particularly long experience with displays and cameras; experience in multimedia applications, from i-mode in the domestic market, has led to software and application expertise. Japanese companies have a technology edge derived from digital media expertise, and particularly long experience with displays and cameras; experience in multimedia applications, from i-mode in the domestic market, has led to software and application expertise.

Natsuno and Ai Kato Launch 505i; and WWJ – Facing a Transition

Herewith, I’d like to query you, the loyal and keen WWJ readers (some 30% of whom are in Europe, according to last fall’s subscriber survey), on what an outsider needs to know about Europe’s mobile Internet. What are the companies, technologies, business models, and content services serving to boost the future? What – and who – matters most? Which will triumph: i-mode or Vodafone Live? Can Japanese terminal makers kick their way into the market? And will the Open Mobile Alliance boost Europe’s wireless industry far ahead of Japan’s – given sufficient buy-in from content providers and software creators?

DoCoMo Plans Flat-rate Mobile Web Access Service

NTT DoCoMo said on Friday it plans to launch a flat-rate wireless Web access service using its personal handyphone system (PHS) network, in a bid to shore up its flagging PHS operation. NTT DoCoMo said on Friday it plans to launch a flat-rate wireless Web access service using its personal handyphone system (PHS) network, in a bid to shore up its flagging PHS operation.

Mass e-mailer ordered to pay 6.5 mil. yen compensation

An Internet service firm has been ordered to fork out over 6.5 million yen to cell phone operator NTT DoCoMo after it sent millions of e-mails to nonexistent addresses, inflicting expenses on the operator. Ruling that NTT DoCoMo had suffered losses because of the mass e-mailing, the Tokyo District Court on Tuesday ordered the unidentified Internet service firm to pay 6.56 million yen in compensation.

Need a Bus Ticket? Use Your Cell Phone

Travelers on some long distant bus routes will be able to pay fares using cellular phones from the end of this month, thanks to a tie-up between Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. and bus firms. The electronics giant aims to introduce the ticketless service on about 80 routes operated by 40 firms during fiscal 2003 and hopes to extend it to theater and other ticketing in the future.

Cell-Based Location Services on Target and Japan has Cheapest WLAN on Earth

So far, Japanese carriers haven’t really pushed location services as stand-alone products; they’re sold as “part of” a handset and there are no handsets that are sold only as, or primarily for, navi-service capabilities. Sure, KDDI did do a big marketing push when their first GPS-enabled keitai hit the market in December 2001, but now it’s just one more feature onboard their fleet (in the January catalog, KDDI showed six of 11 handsets as having GPS capability). Also: Looks like Japan’s WLAN market – in addition to being highly fragmented – is one of the cheapest.

NTT DoCoMo to Expand M-stage Visual Net Service

NTT DoCoMo announced today that the company will expand its M-stage Visual Net service to include Personal Handyphone System (PHS) and land line phones that have teleconferencing capabilities, starting March 24, 2003. M-stage Visual Net provides a communications platform that enables numerous people to participate simultaneously in mobile videoconferencing.

Japan's Generation of Computer Refuseniks

Most teens and young adults in Japan rarely use computers to surf the World Wide Web. Instead they use cell phones to access a scaled-down wireless Web. The result: A growing computer literacy problem among Japan’s youth. Yasushi Takashita smiled sheepishly when his slender girlfriend Rika, clinging to the train stanchion next to him, suggested he use the Internet to search for some college-related information he needs. “I don’t know how to use a PC,” he admitted as the orange Chuo Line train car bumped out of Yoyogi, an area in central Tokyo with a high concentration of private prep schools.

Too Much IT May End Your Love Affair

When Rei Nagashima, a 20-year-old university student, first saw the new-fangled mobile phone, she thought it was pretty cool, not to mention harmless. Equipped with a tiny camera, the sleek device could take and send not only photos, but video clips as well. It was given to Nagashima (not her real name) by her wealthy boyfriend after she taunted him, half jokingly, to buy her a new mobile phone.