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Japan Number Portability: The Autumn of Discontent

The hottest topic roiling Tokyo’s hot street this month is MNP – mobile number portability.

Details on pricing, dates and procedures that Japan’s carriers will follow to implement the regulator-mandated programme have been posted on WWJ in several items on this topic, including here, here and here.. Analysts, pundits and assorted commentators have all more or less concluded that the net winner will be KDDI/au, while the net loser will be DoCoMo (the jury is still out on Vodafone/SoftBank Mobile). At least some are attributing this pending negative migration to mere probability – as the carrier with the largest customer base, they argue, DoCoMo naturally stand to lose the biggest number of churners – all things being equal. But this analysis is weak and WWJ thinks..

KDDI Launches New Handsets and 3G Services

KDDI - 12 New Handsets with Massive 3G Services LaunchKDDI today launched the first strike in Japan’s mobile number portability wars with no less than 10 press releases announced today at Tokyo’s ultra buttoned-down Imperial Hotel. The line-up of phones and services includes new units from Casio (W43CA), Hitachi (W43H), Kyocera (W43K and W44K), Sanyo (W42SA, W43SA and A5522SA), Sharp (W41SH), Sony Ericsson (W43S) and Toshiba (W45T and W47T), plus a new in-house designer model (also by Toshiba) code named Drape.

The accompanying new data offerings unveiled today include a scrolling news service (ala i-channel) and mobile video conferencing, the first such service from KDDI (which, until now, has philosophically posited that video conferencing was not suited for mobile), as well as several improved mobile music and digital TV offerings.

Mobile Entertainment Forum Presentations on Video

Mobile Entertainment Forum Presentations on VideoNaviblog Corp., which showcased their local search and location-based information sharing technology at Mobile Monday Tokyo in May, gave a very entertaining presentation at the Mobile Entertainment Forum, part of the recent Wireless Japan 2006 trade show. In the presentation, Naviblog CEO & President Mandali Khalesi explained their browser-based approach to mobile products in more detail.

Naviblog is a finalist for this year’s Red Herring Asia 100, an award program recognizing the most promising and innovative private technology companies with high growth potential in Asia.

We also have clip of the opening remarks from Qualcomm’s Ted Matsumoto, one of Japan’s and Asia’s most knowledgeable mobile thinkers!

DoCoMo Ready to Roll HTC Smartphone

DoCoMo Ready to Roll HTC SmartphoneNTT DoCoMo and High Tech Computer Corp. (HTC) recently announced that they will start sales in late July of their new “hTc Z” smartphone, equipped with the Microsoft Windows Mobile 5.0 Japanese-edition operating system. The hTc Z will enable a variety of useful mobile business solutions using Windows Server and Exchange Server, in addition to 3G, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and many add-in applications. DoCoMo plans to sell the handsets to corporate customers as part of its “comprehensive business solutions” effort.

We have a quick hands-on demo video for you on this one shot at DoCoMo’s booth during last weeks Wireless Japan event out at Tokyo BigSite. The full specs [.pdf] are available Here.

US and Japan to Lead Mobile TV Market

SoftBank Establishes Mobile TV DivisionSoftBank announced that it has established a new company, Mobile Media Planning Corp., which aims to conduct technical research on MediaFLO and plan new services utilizing such technology. Developed by QUALCOMM, the system enables distribution of multichannel broadcast optimized for mobile communications, including Clipcast, and distribute digital terrestrial broadcasts to mobile terminals and other devices. This technology is considered as one of the three major technologies following satellite broadcast and 1Seg broadcast, and it enables real time broadcast of 20 channels on one TV channel portion of frequency band (6MHz). We interviewed MediaFlo’s Ali Zamari during the recent Wireless Japan trade-show in Tokyo.

Mobile Media Planning plans to provide digital-tv broadcast distribution services for mobile terminals and other devices utilizing such technology for the development of mobile communications business of the SOFTBANK Group. Also, Mobile Media Planning will work on the study of technical potential of MediaFLO, by participating in the activities organized by external parties such as the VHF/UHF-band efficient use working group in Information and Communications Council, which discusses the proposal of multimedia broadcast technology including MediaFLO, and FLO Forum where supporting enterprises from around the world, such as QUALCOMM, participate.

Adobe Japan Plans Revolution

Adobe, which was established in 1982, has 54 overseas offices and more than half its revenue comes from outside the United States. Japan accounts for about 20 percent of revenue, positioning itself as the second-largest country in these terms. It boasts advanced mobile devices and is likely to continue to be one of the strategic markets for Adobe as the company has increased efforts to push its products to mobiles.

[an interesting interview with the incoming president of Adobe Japan — Eds]