Japan Market
Japan Market

Japan Market

UQ Communications Rolling 4G WiMax

The KDDI led consortia, UQ Communications, is geared up for commercial launch later this month in all 23 Tokyo wards, Yokohama and Kawasaki with Nagoya and Osaka coming online in June. The monthly flat-rate access fee is noted at 4,480jpy, or about $40, and will be available for free until June 30th. They also indicate that “UQ Wi-Fi” service will be made freely available on the Shinkansen for some commercial clients as of March and all customers as of September. The group, including Intel, JR East, Kyocera and several banks, formed in September 2007 and gained official approval from the ministry for the 2.5GHz spectrum a few months later.

Japan Telecom Hardware Sales Dropping

The Communications and Information Network Association of Japan – CIAJ – has released a report on mid-term demand for telecom equipment with a gloomy, though predictable, forcast. While exports have been holding YoY results, domestic sales are expected to slip about 14 percent in fiscal 2008. According to their research, confirming widely held industry views, the rapid drop in demand for handsets resulting from the newly implemented sales plan, which raised handset prices has produced this so-called negative growth effect.

Majority of 911 Calls Via Mobile

According to this article on the Mainichi Shimbun, National Police Agency figures released for 2008 show that over 63 percent of calls for emergency services in Japan come from mobile phones. Results showed that a total of 5,165,795 calls were made from mobile phones, up 1.5 percent from the same period the previous year and the biggest year-on-year increase for the period.

In order to trace the source of mobile phone calls, which are harder to track than land line calls, police in 21 prefectures, including the Metropolitan Police Department, have introduced location data reporting systems, with police in 10 other prefectures, including Aomori, planning to buy similar systems by the end of June this year.

Japanese Handset of the Year

The folks at Ktai Watch ran an open to all readers online poll from December 19 – 25th for best handset model of 2008. They managed to collect about 3,000 votes in all and have listed the top 50 Here.

The 931SH by Sharp for SoftBank Mobile topped the list with Fujitsu’s F-01A for DoCOMo coming in 2nd place. So, “What about the 3G iPhone” – we can just hear you screaming that from all over the world – well, it easily took top spot in the Smartphone section with over 60% of the votes 😎

Our Very Best Wishes to Everyone for 2009!

Gree to the World

Japan’s #2 SNS platform – Gree – IPO’d on Mothers stock-exchange last week and saw it’s shares jump 52% on listing day to a valuation of just over $1.2B, closing ahead of Mixi and gliding into 4th place for all digital-focused listed companies in Japan. While claiming approx. 7M users, only half of the Mixi base, Gree is almost entirely a mobile play. Serving as defacto SNS platform for the KDDI/au network, who was an early stage investor, the service offering combines gaming and messaging with a virtual goods model. According to company financials they reported $11M in profit on revenues of $33M in their last fiscal year while noting marked increases in Q1 FYE09. Crisis.. What Crisis?!?

Nokia to Exit the Japan Market

While the Finnish giant is ramping-up to roll it’s Vertu-focused MVNO sometime early next year, the company has announced it has decided to pull their regular device line-up, including the just announced E-71 model for DoCoMo, according to this statement: “In the current global economic climate, we have concluded that the continuation of our investment in Japan-specific product variants is no longer sustainable.” By most estimates the world-leading ODM managed less than 1% penetration in the hyper-competative Japanese handset market.

Keitai by COACH via KDDI

Keitai by COACH Via KDDICoach and KDDI have announced they will offer limited edition COACH branded handsets – 1,941 units available, based on the company being founded in 1941 – from December. These models are produced by SonyEricsson using the Full-Change skin styling features with a focus not only on exterior but also the main menu and standby screen. It should also be noted that – at least from what we can tell – the retail price of, not suprisingly, 19,041jpy (about $200usd) is only for the accessories. So clients will need to buy the main handset – at open market price – as well thank-you very much. Here’s to betting they sell-out in a heartbeat!

Nokia To Launch MVNO in Japan

Finnish cell phone manufacturer Nokia will start its own cellphone service in Japan as early as February 2009 according to this article on the Yomiuri Shimbun. Apparently the Finnish manufacturing giant is rumored to run service on the Docomo network, although it was widely reported this summer they would go with SoftBank, for it’s luxury Vertu handset lineup.

NEC Bringing on the BubbleTalk

NEC Bringing on the BubbleTalkNEC and Bubble Motion have announced the formation of a global partnership agreement. Under the terms, NEC will exclusively provide the BubbleTALK service to telecom operators in the Japanese market. BubbleTALK enables users to send short voice messages – basically voice sms – directly to the receiver’s handset. NEC and Bubble Motion will collaborate to provide the underlying products, functionality and related services, while NEC provides deployment and technical support for operators in Japan. Additionally, the companies are aiming to offer BubbleTALK to telecom operators worldwide and create synergies between BubbleTALK and NEC’s NGN products, such as NC series and IP Messaging.