New Tech & Services
New Tech & Services

GeoVector and NEC Team Up

GeoVector has announced a partnership with NEC to enable Japanese mobile content providers to offer information for end users to simply point their mobile phones at a building, retailer, restaurant, hotel or billboard advertisement. Just like using a mouse to click on your computer screen to retrieve information, now mobile phone users in Japan can Click on the Real World using their mobile phone, aided by GPS and a built-in compass. GeoVector’s technology makes a variety of innovative content-based applications and M-commerce transactions possible.

QUALCOMM Enhances Deployment of Location Services for WCDMA

QUALCOMM announced that it has streamlined the deployment process for providing location services on WCDMA (UMTS)/HSDPA/GSM/GPRS/EDGE networks around the world. Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) Secure User Plane for Location (SUPL) 1.0 software is now offered broadly across QUALCOMM’s WCDMA (UMTS) portfolio of Mobile Station Modem (MSM) chipsets as part of the gpsOne solution, offering a consistent platform for the rollout of Assisted-GPS (A-GPS) technology and the location services it enables. Support for the OMA SUPL 1.0 protocol, accepted industry-wide, delivers significant cost-efficiency benefits for network operators deploying location services and offers wireless users a seamless experience when roaming onto other WCDMA (UMTS)/HSDPA and GSM/GPRS/EDGE networks.

RFID Assistant Robot Tests

NTT Communications and Tmsuk will test an RFID-driven shopping assistant robot at a shoping mall in Fukuoka. The robot reads RFID tags embedded in the floor and get information about its location (it doesn’t use GPS or other location technologies). The pilot test will take place on the 9th of February and lasts till the 15th. The robot can assist in-store shoppers as well as remote shoppers at home.

JR East Cranks up Cell-phone Tickets

A new service using mobile phones as smart tickets for trains operated by East Japan Railway Co. began Saturday. The service, named Mobile Suica, combines the service of JR East’s Suica IC card and mobile phone service offered by NTT DoCoMo Inc. and KDDI Corp. Once customers pay for train fees or train passes online, they can go through JR wickets in and around Tokyo by just holding their handsets over card readers on the ticket gates, according to the railway. (Mobile Suica is finally in operation! See today’s Viewpoint — Eds.)

Japan Rail Launches Mobile Wallet Phone Service

Japan Rail Launches Mobile Wallet Phone Service by Mobikyo KKOn a sunny Saturday morning here in Tokyo, Japan Rail launched their long-awaited Mobile Suica service, which will allow customers to use their FeliCa-enabled Osaifu ketai (wallet phone) to get into the station simply by swiping their handset past the turnstile reader. The service will be available at almost 900 stations located in the Tokyo, Sendai, Niigata, and Kansai regions. On roll-out day the system supports 12 handset models from DoCoMo and KDDI; none of the three available Vodafone units will be supported at launch. Interesting to note that DoCoMo’s latest F702iD, just announced last week, will be accepted as well. Until now, it has in fact not been possible to use your phone as a train ticket in Japan. Despite all the live demonstrations, trade-show hype and media speculation around FeliCa, the FeliCa-based Suica cards used by JR and the FeliCa-based handsets sold by DoCoMo, KDDI and Vodafone have been incompatible. As the well-established ‘Suica’ card is also accepted at many shops (including Bic Camera, a major electronics chain) in and around JR stations, this move will undoubtedly push up the volume of mobile payments made in 2006. It should come as no surprise that NTT DoCoMo announced on 26 January that sales of their FeliCa handsets passed the 10 million mark, a notable increased from the stated [.pdf] circulation of 7.7 million units in November 2005.

3-D Avatars for Video Chat

Video-conferencing handsets are taking off, but what about those who shirk the spotlight? Engineers think animated 3-D avatars [.jpg image] may be the answer. “Think of when you’re having a bad hair day,” quips Mike Danielsen of Motorola Labs when asked why he has spent two years developing 3-D animated avatars that can mime a live user’s speech and actions on mobile-phone handsets. Motorola already has phone avatars available in China and Japan, but “they’re highly cartoony,” says Danielson. International competitors include Japan’s Oki Electric Industry, which has developed the FaceCommunicator application for PCs and mobile phones to generate both two- and three-dimensional animated avatars using motion- and voice-tracking as well as key commands.