Panasonic Mobile announced today that it has developed two prototypes of mobile phones equipped with wireless LAN 802.11b/g module. Using wireless LAN module, the handset could be utilized as high quality IP TV phone or as player, server, and controller to enjoy rich digital contents wirelessly with DLNA compliant products at home. These two prototypes will be exhibited at its booth at the ITU TELECOM WORLD 2006 to be held in Hong Kong, China from December 4 to 8.
Oki Electric just announced it has succeeded in developing Iris Recognition Technology for Mobile Terminals. This technology is based on OKI’s original iris recognition algorithm using standard optical cameras that are equipped in mobile terminals. OKI plans to commercialize this product worldwide starting March 2007. OKI has been providing FSE (Face Sensing Engine) middleware for embedded systems, as a security product to enable personal authentication using mobile terminals.
Sanyo, which is headed for its third straight loss this business year, plans to sell its cellphone operations as part of a new restructuring plan, the Nihon Keizai newspaper reported on Thursday. The business daily said Sanyo, which earlier this year issued $2.6 billion worth of preferred shares on very favourable terms to Goldman Sachs and two other financial institutions to ensure its survival, will also sell its semiconductor division. Sadakazu Shima, a spokesman for the Osaka-based electronics maker, declined to comment on the report.
UPDATE: Sanyo has denied the rumor and will disclose details of its reorganization when it reports first-half earnings on Friday.
Goldman Sachs has pulled out of the Y1,450bn ($12.4bn) refinancing for Softbank’s acquisition of Vodafone Japan, raising fresh concerns about the Japanese communications group. Analysts say the US investment bank’s move to quit the lending syndicate suggests it has misgivings about the terms of the loan, which is supported by revenues from the mobile arm. Despite the setback, Softbank expects the refinancing to go ahead at the end of this month. Softbank said other lenders would fill the gap left by Goldman’s departure. The syndicate includes Deutsche, Citibank and Mizuho.
NEC Corp., losing share to Sharp Corp. and Toshiba Corp. in Japan’s mobile-phone market, said its first- half loss widened fivefold because of a slump in sales. Shares of NEC have slid 35 percent since this year’s peak in April as Toshiba overtook the company in handset sales in the fiscal first-half. NEC today cut its mobile phone shipment target by 33 percent and said the business will post a 48 billion yen operating loss this fiscal year, instead of a previously forecast for a 15 billion yen loss.
NEC announced that theywill develop equipment for Super 3G handsets, following a request for proposal from NTT DoCoMo, NEC plans to deliver commercial Super 3G mobile handsets in 2010. The Super 3G standard is expected to provide super fast downlink data rates of over 100Mbps and uplink data rates of over 50Mbps, low-latency data transmission and improved spectrum efficiency. Super 3G features highly advanced versions of high-speed downlink packet access (HSDPA) and high-speed uplink packet access (HSUPA), which are W-CDMA packet transmission technologies standardized by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP).
