It’s official! The Mobile Monday (MoMo) event on 27 June happens at KDDI’s super-cool Designing Studio in Harajuku – an incredible venue matched only by the stellar line-up of presenters: Warner Music Japan, Be4 and GMAP. For more information and to register early, access the MoMo site at: http://www.mobilemonday.jp.
Casio’s rugged water-and-shock resistant mobile handsets from KDDI launched at a press event held in the celco’s shiny Harajuku Designing Studio first-floor theater; both features are firsts for a 3G handset and the G’zOne [flash site here] certainly looks like it should be hanging from a REI backpack while its user hammers pylons into a sheer rock face. An optional handle-cum-customized protector curves around the handset’s top edge, just begging for a carabiner clip. The phone has two screens, a 2.2-inch QVGA on the inside and 1-inch circular screen centered in the front cover.
All three models, the C303C, C311CA and C409CA, are covered in a tough polyurethane material with a magnesium alloy body to absorb hard knocks. G’zOne’s front screen functions as an electronic compass orienting with the built-in GPS tracking system and linked to KDDI’s signature EZ Navi walk navigation system, all ready for urban trailblazing. Even if your most arduous climb is the subway steps at Harajuku’s Omote Sando station, that water-resistant function could come in very handy when typhoon season hits. KDDI says the handset can withstand 30 minutes in water at a depth of one meter (although they admit tap water was used in the testing rather than chilly spring snow run-off). Thankfully the launch day event was held inside… 🙂
Digital terrestrial broadcasting for mobile phones is scheduled to begin in Japan by spring 2006 and both Vodafone and KDDI had demonstration models up and running on the first day of the NHK Science and Technical Research Laboratories open house yesterday. An annual event open to the public, this year’s show focused once again on digital TV broadcasting with three floors of cameras, servers, receivers and handheld devices. Mobile receivers drew packed crowds herded into Disneyland-style long lines waiting their turn to handle an 801SH Vodafone/Sharp CDMA Qualcomm handset. No bigger than a conventional cell phone, the 801SH has a hybrid split-screen displaying images on the upper half with the bottom reserved for scrolling data feeds and Web links to programming, etc. Exclusive from Wireless Watch Japan!
Japan’s Spring handset blitzkrieg is on the attack. Just last week, DoCoMo launched the first barrage with the five-model 901iS-series of phones boasting PDF file navigation capabilities and a four-megapixel model, the D901iS. Today, KDDI counterattacked with a press conference at the New Takanawa Prince Hotel announcing five June-release au handsets to support live analog TV reception and ramped-up EZ television features — plus a new SafetyNavi GPS function.
The handsets: W32SA by Sanyo; W31CA by Casio; W31T from Toshiba; A5511T also Toshiba; and the A5512CA by Casio. They integrate a mix of music and business functions: download capacity for attached mail has been expanded and one of the models, the W31CA, has a 3.2-megapixel camera, which is pretty good (but not as good as DoCoMo’s latest).
Previously, in order to save on packet fees, KDDI’s WIN platform EZ Channel provided late-night video content downloads for later viewing. Flat-rate services have now produced an EZ Television channel for live analog terrestrial TV programming right to the mobile. Dubbed “interactive TV” by KDDI, the new handsets can record TV theme songs, soundtracks and commercial jingles as BGM (background music) via the Chaku Uta full music download feature. There’s also a search & buy function for CDs used in programs or commercials. For an extra fee, users can subscribe to Premium or Deluxe EZ TV services. Premium costs an additional 210 yen/month and adds remote recording functionality; Deluxe allows users to pre-register names and programs for automatic recording at 315 yen.
ACCESS announced that it has collaborated with Abaxia to integrate its MobileTag 2D barcode reader solution with ACCESS’ NetFront® Mobile Client Suite, the world’s most advanced, integrated browser-based software solution for advanced multimedia-enabled mobile phones. The joint solution enables a new data capture model between mobile devices and barcode-enabled applications like advertisements, brochures, posters, direct-mailers, or any object that can support a barcode.
With little fanfare and no press conference, NTT DoCoMo has released five new 3G FOMA 901iS FeliCa-enabled handsets into the digital world: D901iS (Mitsubishi), F901iS (Fujitsu), P901iS (Panasonic), N901iS (NEC) and SH901iS (Sharp). All have certain features in common with other 901i models, including music players, “3D Sound,” Deco-Mail to decorate email, G-GUIDE interactive TV guide and recording programmer (see the .pdf for full specs). New features include a 4-megapixel recorded resolution camera for the D901iS and a full Web browser on the N901iS. The company says that the 901iS-series is DoCoMo’s first in which all models are equipped for mobile-wallet functions, but the five handsets actually do a lot more than drain virtual bank accounts. The pre-installed Adobe Reader LE, for example, enables 901iS phones to view PDF files downloaded from i-mode sites. The application includes access to all basic PDF functions including scrolling, paging, text searches, bookmarks and page rotation and users can easily email files, dial a number or navigate to a Web link in the file. But wait, there’s more…
