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KDDI, Vodafone Enlist Artists to the Cause

Yesterday, the Wireless Watch Japan site was slammed by record traffic after we posted our first big Net news scoop: Casio’s announcement of what appears to be the world’s first 3-megapixel camera phone, due for release later this summer via KDDI. And that wasn’t the only big Japan handset news from the past few days: both KDDI (working with Hitachi) and NTT DoCoMo have announced concept models capable of receiving terrestrial digital TV broadcasts, while Vodafone’s been mentioned as working on new karaoke-enabled handsets with Sharp and Toshiba. Phones in Japan have become culturally connected communicators and terminal makers who think more like artists and less like engineers will flourish.

Japan's 2003 Cellular Shipments Figures

Japan’s mobile phone shipments for fiscal 2003 approached the record high. The Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association (JEITA) has announced that the total number of shipments for fiscal year 2004 (Apr. ’03 to Mar. ’04) reached 49,843,000 units, following two years of consecutive growth.

Casio Launches 3-Megapixel Camera Phone

Today, Casio announced the world’s first 3.2-megapixel camera phone, the A5406CA [image] for KDDI. Fully equipped with an automatic focus function, the 2048ױ536 QXGA image size compares in quality to what the company calls “traditional” digital cameras. Mobile snappers can choose from 9 Best Shot modes, including twilight, panoramic, fireworks, and the unlikely named “food” setting. The unit also boasts up to 60 minutes of video recording (clips are saved to the onboard 12-MB data folder). A WWJ English Web news scoop! Press Release in Japanese.

Toshiba Announces Latest Strategic Memory Roadmaps

Toshiba Corporation today announced its latest strategic roadmaps for the memory market, which reflect the company’s continued focus on the rapidly-growing file storage market, the mobile electronics memory market, and high-performance solutions for networking and digital consumer applications. This market segmentation enables Toshiba to respond rapidly to customer requirements and develop advanced memory solutions to meet their needs. Toshiba’s current line-up of memory products serving these three market segments includes NAND Flash, high-density NOR Flash, low-power SRAMs, Pseudo SRAMs (PSRAMs) and advanced Multi-Chip Packages (MCP) which integrate various memory technologies into a single package; and for the networking and extreme performance digital consumer market, Network Fast-Cycle RAMs (Network FCRAMs(TM)) and XDR(TM) DRAM.

DoCoMo Launching New 506i Models

DoCoMo announced today the release of D506i and F506i, two new handsets in the 2G i-mode compatible mova 506i series, that will be marketed beginning May 19, 2004. The D506i [.jpg image] features a voice-activated camera shutter and multifunctional side button to activate the camera for stills/video or the voice recorder, even while the handset is closed. The F506i [.jpg image] includes a 2.04 mega-pixels autofocus CCD camera with a sweep-type fingerprint sensor. You can also get a sneak peek at the new 506i series models in our video coverage from the recent launch event.

Kyocera's Opera Browser Cell Phone

DDI Pocket has introduced this new AH-K3001V handset by Kyocera, the “AirH” terminal has a 2.2 inch QVGA TFT screen that displays 260,000 colors, with a 1.1 mega-pixel camera onboard. All pretty much standard, but it also features an Opera browser which enables POP3 and SMTP e-mail functions, and even has a mini-B type USB terminal that will connect with your PC.