Taito Corp, a Japanese game software developer, and Finland’s mobile communications company, Nokia Corp, announced on Aug 28 a plan for joint presentation of a karaoke application to be used on cell phones in Asia. Taito will offer an application using its karaoke data format, “Sequential Display Object Format” (SDOF) for Nokia’s GSM-compatible mobile phone “Nokia 3300.”
iFone Ltd, the leading global wireless entertainment publisher, today announced the creation of content based on QUALCOMM’s Binary Runtime Environment for Wireless (BREW) platform. The company plans to roll out an extensive catalog of BREW- based titles such as classic Atari favorites Centipede, Asteroids and Breakout. iFone is also creating BREW-based content that takes advantage of the company’s exclusive global wireless rights to Hasbro brands and is planning to offer BREW-based versions of family favorites, including Monopoly, Clue and Battleship.
Talking to an analyst friend today, we came across the question, how many packets are there in a typical 10-minute video clip encoded for a 3G phone? We asked ourselves this question because, just now, the local press in Japan has caught up with DoCoMo’s plans to roll out HSDPA in late 2004, about a month after WWJ reported on it..!!
Mobile gaming is seen by many as the next big thing, as phones become more powerful and come with colour screens. People are going to be spending millions of pounds to play games on their mobiles by next year, say experts. “This has been a very good year for mobile gaming,” said games consultant Robert Tercek.
No. 1 mobile phone maker Nokia, planning an aggressive push into video gaming, on Tuesday said it has signed a deal to acquire some assets of Japanese game maker Sega Corp. dedicated to networked game play. Nokia will use the SNAP technology for wireless game matching for its N-Gage phone/game deck combo device, set to be released worldwide on Oct. 7.
We spent an afternoon at the Symbian Workshop in Tokyo recently and chatted with Nokia’s Gerard Bruen, Director of Series 60 and Alliance Partners. Tune in for a surprisingly candid discussion about what the big push was for this event.. “the Japanese market is sophisticated, the developers have a good understanding, there is a good eco-system already built around financially stable developers and content owners and we should utilize that.. Nokia has the reach to go global, and to take them global”. A must see interview for wireless developers everywhere who are planning their mobile business strategy.
KTF Co, the No.2 mobile operator, said earnings fell about 4.5 percent in the second quarter of 2003 because of higher interest payments and one-off charges. Smaller rival LG Telecom saw its net profit plunge 57 percent because of higher operating costs.
NEC Corporation today announced, through its subsidiary NEC America, a leading provider of innovative communications products, solutions and services, the launch of its 515 High Definition Mobile+ (HDM) handset to be sold through AT&T Wireless retail outlets. This exclusive relationship offers the benefit of AT&T Wireless’ powerful network combined with NEC’s global experience in handset development and manufacturing. Available to U.S. consumers on July 28, the 515 HDM will serve as a premiere gaming handset delivering both enhanced game play capabilities and multimedia messaging.
Japan’s largest mobile phone carrier NTT DoCoMo said it is offering a free software update to users of its latest SH505i mobile phone handset due to software bugs that could erase certain data. The software problems involve the i-APRI service, which allows users to download games and other types of application software from NTT DoCoMo’s network.
ACCESS, a global provider of mobile content delivery and access technologies for information appliances, today announced that its Compact NetFrontTM Plus micro-browser and JV-LiteTM 2 Wireless Edition, a Java-enabling module for mobile phones, have been deployed in NEC’s latest handset. The N341i is compatible with the GPRS-based Spanish i-mode service ‘MoviStar e-mocion’ which , launched on June 26, 2003.
