Since it’s ‘the big day’ we thought that it would be fitting to post a follow-up to our original comments back in January. While there has been an incredible amount of discussion around this topic over the last few months, the observation below from Russell over at Mowser pretty much sums it up best.
Telcordia Technologies announced that it has enabled KDDI America, Inc. to launch a MVNO that offers prepaid services and tariffs targeted to Japanese communities in the United States. KDDI America will be relying on the Telcordia Hosted Solution for MVNOs, which offers pre-paid and post-paid wireless services without having to own or manage a network. KDDI America will specifically be providing a real-time pre-paid service that includes flexible rates on calls to and from Japan.
Verizon Wireless has announced their m-commerce service, enabled as a BREW application from technology partner Obopay as the first mobile payment offering for any major U.S. carrier, will be available in the coming weeks. The Obopay service will allow customers to receive, send and spend money via their mobile phones, check their account balances, collect money owed from other mobile users, view transaction histories and invite friends to use the system.
According to PC World, Cellular South in Jackson, Miss., joined USA Technologies in Malvern, Pa., this week to announce a two-city consumer trial of WirelessWallet, a service that will let consumers make m-commerce payments from a cell phone. They will use handsets from Kyocera that will act as a digital credit card enabling customers to tap & go their phone on a NFC terminal to make purchases.
According to this press release the MLB Washington Nationals became the first major sports team in the United States to use mobile phone ticketing technology in April. Tickets@Phone will allow fans to have their tickets delivered to their phone via text message which includes a unique barcode along with standard ticket information. The barcode may be scanned for entry at the left side of Main Gate at RFK Stadium. Once scanned, each guest will receive a print out of their ticket to be retained throughout the game.
This article by the Asahi Shimbun, stating that KDDI will launch services on Sprint Nextels network, has created alot of buzz across the web in the last 24hrs. According to that story the company “… has obtained a business license to serve as a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) in 49 of the 50 U.S. states”. While of course it makes perfect sense to us for KDDI to consider how they might port the lessons learned here into other developing markets, the details provided from this original source raised more questions than they answered. The Asahi quotes un-named officials, no announcement appears on either of the carriers websites, saying that “KDDI Mobile” will begin offering full-scale services in the U.S. by mid-April.
