NEC Electronics have announced the start of sample shipments of its newly developed chipset for mobile phones. The LSI AP131 accommodates music playing CPU and DSP on its board and adds support for WMV (ASF) and MP (MP4, M4A, 3GP, 3G2). The previous version of this product, the PD99910, had only support for SD-Audio (MP3, AAC) format. NEC is asking 1,000 yen per sample and plans to output one million chipsets per month in 2007.
Happy New Year greetings from Masayoshi Son and friends at the former Vodafone Japan – now SoftBank Mobile – came in the form of this press release [.pdf in Japanese] announcing they will offer a limited flat-rate voice package starting mid-January. The 980jpy per month deal allows unlimited voice calling and mobile mail, effective between SoftBank 3G customers, from 1 a.m and 9 p.m. Son also apparently promised if competitors decide to follow his lead, offering a lower rate, within 24 hours he will undercut their prices.
Osaka-based Dorga Ltd.has announced their Time Machine Navi application which displays historic scenery according to the position and the direction of an enabled cellphone screen. The sample site, Ruins of Heijo Palace in Nara, was unveiled in the final report of the ‘Intellectual Cluster Creation Business’ that the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology creation has been funding since 2002.
Three major electronics companies have been sued by a foundation which claims that their use of Bluetooth wireless technology infringed on patented work at the University of Washington. According to the lawsuit, Bluetooth-based computers, cell phones and headsets made by Matsushita, Samsung, and Nokia have violated four patents, including one that was issued for research done in the mid-1990s by Edwin Suominen when he was an undergraduate student at the University of Washington.
HitachiSoft has announced the launch of its “GeoMation Keitai” series, a GIS (Geographic Information System) product that will allow users to view and renew GIS-managed business data previously restricted to environments such as the office LAN from their mobile phones. “GeoMation Keitai” enables users not only to view business data from the field, but also renew it securely from their mobile phones. The software can be used with DoCoMo and au, and is compatible with other mobile phone applications.
Market trends with a positive impact on the total figure in FY2006 were robust IP and fiber optic markets pushing up shipment of routers, LAN switches and digital transmission equipment, expansion of cellular phone services, increasing demand for base station communication equipment, and the growth in multipurpose office equipment as businesses aim for improved efficiency and compliance. However, the figure for cellular handsets is expected to have remained the same as FY2005, leading to the FY2006 forecast figure of 4.332 trillion yen, a relatively flat growth over the previous year.
