NTT DoCoMo, Inc. announced today that it will market P2402, the first FOMA CompactFlash card that will enable 3G videophone and other wireless data communications via PCs and PDAs such as DoCoMo’s sigmarion III, beginning November 28, 2003. The new flash card will enable PDA users to begin enjoying FOMA services, as DoCoMo presently provides the PC typed FOMA card that is only applicable to PCs with PC card slots.
Lost your forklift in your cluttered factory? Hitachi Ltd. and Hitachi Cable Ltd have announced they are launching the IEEE802.11b-WLAN/ GPS Hitachi AirLocation system that can locate it. With an accuracy of 1-3 meters, the system works with twin servers and five dedicated basestations to find whatever, for a cost of 5 million yen for the system.
Today Enfour Group announced launch date for GlobalNavi – their new roaming content on Vodafone Global Standard (VGS) – Vodafone K.K.’s 3GPP-based, high-speed W-CDMA network. This new mobile service, called GlobalNavi, aggregates a full suite of data and voice services catering for the needs of international travellers in their native language. This service takes full advantage of the first truely global data roaming service provided by VGS.
Mediastick Inc started a new service called “Let’s do MEDIASTICK” for mobile phone users on November 1. The service requires specific hardware and software to read the barcodes, but cell phones that are equipped with decoder software, called “QR Code Decoder,” such as NTT DoCoMo’s F505i, SH505i and D505iS series, also support Mediastick’s system. All types of the 505iS series to be released from November can read the barcodes for the service.
Fujitsu Laboratories Ltd announced that it built a prototype wireless LAN-capable compact personal digital assistant (PDA) featuring a 4-inch SVGA LCD display with a resolution of 800 x 600 pixels. It has 802.11b wireless LAN, Bluetooth and infrared communication capabilities so that it can access directly to a LAN or virtual private network (VPN) without using any communication tool.
JCB Co., Ltd. has announced a biometric authentication trial project in a mobile environment. The trial starts November in Japan with JCB testing the usefulness of fingerprint authentication for mobile access to JCB’s on-line cardmember account inquiry service ‘MyJCB’, using NTT DoCoMo’s F505i mobile phone equipped with a fingerprint scanner. In this trial, the participants download the JCB Safety Login i-appli application, developed in cooperation with Fujitsu Ltd., to the F505i mobile phone to verify fingerprints information.
