DoCoMo has tossed its FeliCa chips on the table, and they’ll probably end up a winning number. In a press release today, Big D revealed that they are releasing their, and the world’s, first i-mode FeliCa Service smart-card handset on a (Gasp! Huff! Huge Disappointment!! Not 3G!!) mova P506iC 2G phone, on 10 July 2004. WWJ video of the 506i event here.
Here in Tokyo, the tension is killing us – waiting for Vodafone to break out of its bolt hole and unleash its global-spanning battlewagon of 3G W-CDMA phones. While new management here does whatever it’s supposed to be doing to sweeten up Vodafone’s sour performanceof late, Little-V still has the muscle, and Sharp always the technology, it seems, to pull something out of the hat; this time its the V602SH, packing a 2.02-megapixel camera (small yawn) plus a real eye opener – an optical zoom! See for yourself in our video program from the Tokyo Business Show in May.
Radioplan, a leading supplier of 3G radio network simulation, optimisation, and measurement analysis solutions, has been selected to supply radio network optimisation tools and services to four new customers in EMEA and Japan. Following extensive technical trials and evaluations of a wide range of tools, Radioplan?s WiNeS optimisation platform and consulting services were chosen to support demanding pre-launch optimisation projects by both 3G vendors and 3G mobile operator clients.
The news out of Vodafone today is that Darryl E. Green, CEO of both Vodafone KK and Vodafone Holdings KK, has resigned for personal reasons. An interim CEO has been appointed while the companies search for a permanent replacement. Green’s departure is not unrelated, we suspect, to Vodafone’s recent grim Japanese financial results. While it’s too early for a full postmortem, it might help bring perspective to the situation to point out a number of successes that Vodafone achieved on Green’s watch.
NTT DoCoMo, Inc. and its eight regional subsidiaries today announced the July 2004 launch of the i-mode FeliCa Service for mobile wallet applications, which will be used in combination with the company’s first four NFC enabled i-mode handsets—three 2G mova 506iC series models and the 3G FOMA F900iC handset—which also will be launched in early July.
Originally published as a guest column in Fierce Wireless, 9 June – Ed.
If 2001-2003 has been Phase 1 of Japan’s 3G era (all three major carriers launched W-CDMA or CDMA 2000 networks in this period), then 2004 is definitely shaping up to be Phase 2 — and the difference is that now Japan 3G is moving overseas. The assault is being led in part by Japan’s keitai makers who, under NTT DoCoMo’s lash, have invested heavily in sophisticated new terminals and are now looking to markets further afield in order to generate additional ROI.
