New Tech & Services
New Tech & Services

New Tech & Services

Japan Cell-phone-accessible ATMs Coming

Cell-phone ATMsWWJ’s Lawrence Cosh-Ishii, our director of digital media and resident video and mobile guru, was in Tokyo this afternoon wrapping up a long day and heading for a few frosty Kirin lagers when he spotted this headline at a news kiosk. Normally, when we latch onto breaking Japan mobile news, we go into hypernewsroom mode, working the phones, Googling the keywords and pinging folks in the know to get as full and in-depth a report as we can — and get the gen onto the site pronto for our loyal WWJ community.

Today, in view of the fact that Tokyo’s Friday Happy Hour is already in progress, we decided to employ a little mobile Internet magic ourselves and get the info to you as directly as we can: Lars grabbed a snap with his trusty Sharp 3G camera keitai and fired it into the WWJ newsroom for more-or-less instant posting.

Oh yes: the news. Looks like Japanese mobilers will be able to access Mitsui Sumitomo ATMs using their phone starting this fall. Looks like the transaction will occur via the FeliCa IC chip. You’ll probably just have to set the phone on a little alcove in the machine and press some keys. More details when we get them. Have a great weekend and happy ‘Beer O’Clock’ wherever you are!

Onyx Introduces Advanced Wireless CRM For Japanese Market

Onyx Software Corporation, a worldwide leader in customer management solutions for the enterprise, today announced Onyx Employee Portal Wireless (OEP Wireless) for Japan. Part of an integrated suite of mobile enterprise CRM solutions, OEP Wireless for Japan is immediately available for Foma 3G and mova 2G Series iMode devices. Onyx’s introduction of OEP Wireless for Japan offers 45 million iMode users access to Onyx’s versatile CRM platform for delivering enhanced customer service and satisfaction. OEP Wireless for Japan increases business productivity by keeping mobile professionals connected and informed, while delivering advanced capabilities for quickly and easily managing customer and partner account, sales, service and support activities.

Mobile Healthcare Launches Lifewatcher

After more than three years years in R&D, Tokyo-based Mobile Healthcare Inc. today announced the commercial launch of ‘Lifewatcher,’ a new disease management service that operates over mobile phones and the Internet. According to the company, Lifewatcher is a comprehensive, patient-centric, mobile disease self-management system for diabetes, obesity, and other lifestyle-related disease sufferers. It is critical for diabetes sufferers to track key health indicators such as blood sugar, blood pressure, calorie intake, exercise and their weight. WWJ posted a video interview with company president James Nakagawa on the then-under-development service in 2003.

Usen Launches 3G Radio Service

Usen Corp., a cable radio operator turned multimedia content provider, started a four-channel streaming radio service in Japan on Monday via the 3G cell phone network of NTT DoCoMo Inc. The service is available at no cost to users of 19 models of NTT DoCoMo 3G handset as Usen will use the service to promote its ringtone download site, said Ami Okane, a Usen spokeswoman. Under the name of the song playing there are links that will take users to the download page for that song’s ringtone.

GPS Phones for Emergency Guidance

Kyoto University and the research arm of telecom carrier KDDI Corp. conducted an experiment Friday to see how mobile phones equipped with global positioning systems can be used to provide evacuation guidance in the event of a disaster. About 30 students took part in the experiment, held in the vicinity of the university’s campus in Kyoto, bringing with them GPS-equipped phones designed to display the nearest evacuation center.

KDDI Launching New Voice App

KDDI and Okinawa cellular have announced what they claim to be the world’s first “Voice Input” function of a decentralized voice recognition feature. To be released in cooperation with the popular GPS service EZ Navi walk, the new offering will become available for their au customers as of early February 2006. Based on a server-side application, “voice recognition on large-scale can achieve high accuracy compared to past versions” (which ran processed commands on the handset) according to the company press release.