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SoftBank Mobile Summer Handsets

SoftBank Mobile announced their handset lineup for the ‘Summer of 2007 Sales Battle’ which will be available from the beginning of June. According to the company press release the 12 new 3G models are focused on style, quality and individuality, see the dedicated Flash site [in Japanese] Here. We note six handsets are coming from Sharp, including the 913SH slider while the upstart telco claims a scoop for the first deployment in Japan of Windows Mobile 6 on two of the units from HTC. Toshiba added three models with Samsung and Panasonic each contributing one. More details after the jump.

DoCoMo 2.0 — Message Lost in Translation?

DoCoMo 2.0 -- Message Lost in Translation? by Mobikyo KKOn Monday 23 April NTT DoCoMo unveiled their latest 3G handsets, the 904i-series, at a press conference held here in downtown Tokyo.

WWJ pointed to this webcast of their presentation, which clearly stated from the very beginning the new “DoCoMo 2.0” campaign theme.

We shouldn’t really be surprised that the main message, from Japan’s dominant mobile operator, contained in the announcement somehow managed to get 2.0 attention from the mainstream media. With few exceptions, the entire tech web focused on the motion-sensor for gaming application. Few if any noted how ironic it was that while the company insisted it was going to “focus on offering unique applications and services that will be difficult for the competition to duplicate” they were in fact introducing a functionality which was originally made available in Japan [video here] by Vodafone and Sharp over two years ago.

Perhaps the gritty details — such as the fact that all five new models will (of course) ship pre-installed with the Osaifu-Keitai FeliCa mobile wallet together with related security services — are less appealing to the overseas media than Nokia’s recent announcement that they, too, have the mobile wallet urge?

To be sure, there were a few interesting new offerings in Natsuno-san’s presentation, such as the 2-in-1 dual-identity option and flat-rate access to Napster’s full music library service. However, one of the main observations we take away from this news is that the rest of the world still tends to focus only on the most quirky headlines (wait until the MSM find out about this one). WWJ subscribers login for our thoughts on this latest development.

KDDI to Launch U.S. Operations

This article by the Asahi Shimbun, stating that KDDI will launch services on Sprint Nextels network, has created alot of buzz across the web in the last 24hrs. According to that story the company “… has obtained a business license to serve as a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) in 49 of the 50 U.S. states”. While of course it makes perfect sense to us for KDDI to consider how they might port the lessons learned here into other developing markets, the details provided from this original source raised more questions than they answered. The Asahi quotes un-named officials, no announcement appears on either of the carriers websites, saying that “KDDI Mobile” will begin offering full-scale services in the U.S. by mid-April.

Is Mobile 2.0 Really Just Hype?

Paul Golding at Wireless Wanders posted an interesting op-ed about the hype surrounding mobile 2.0. While it’s clear that he’s looking at this from a Euro/US perspective – especially on the device side – however, we have no doubt there are some valid points contained therein. At the same time it should be also noted that Impress R&D (div. of the major Tokyo-based publisher) released a book last summer called Mobile 2.0 [in Japanese] which would likely shed a little more light on what is actually possible, at least in Japan.

Find a Guinness with your Phone

Diageo Japan launched a one-click mobile pub search service called “Guinness Navi” on March 17, 2007, just in time for St. Paddys Day. Guinness Navi location based service allows users to search for nearby Guinness outlets easily with their mobile phone, although the venues are currently restricted to Irish pub search within Tokyo’s 23 wards, it plans to increase its scope to other areas, and to dining bars, local bars and other outlets. The system is compatible with all locational technologies from antenna triangulation cell ID, to GPS, WiFi and direct address input and was developed by Tokyo-based Naviblog Corp.

GPS Mandate Set to Take Effect

A recent article via the Yomiuri Shimbun re-states that services offering the GPS location of callers will be required on all new 3G cell phones in Japan starting April 1st in an effort to aid emergency callers. With the increased use of mobile phones has come an increased number of emergency calls placed on them. Among the 9.39 million emergency calls police received in 2005, 59 percent were made from cell phones. However, callers were often unable to explain their exact location when calling from mobile phones.

Train 'em up early: kids' phones rock!

I was talking to my accountant last week; she’s a smart, self-employed mid-career professional with a husband and kids and she’s definitely one of the more practical-minded Europeans I know.

We were talking about ‘handys’ (keitai, in Germany), and I told her about the huge success the mobile Internet and 3G are having (still) in Japan, versus in Europe where no one’s making a single (Euro) cent on UMTS. Her reaction was typical, but interesting: “I’m not going to use the phone for sending mail or anything but talking. The keypad is far too tiny. It’s just not in the mindset of my generation.”

Japan Mobile Industry News Mash-up

It’s been a rather hectic few weeks here, as mentioned at the end of our latest WWJ Newsletter, so we thought a chocolate covered bundle of tidbits would be in order today. With 3GSM running this week in Barcelona, on top of the usual post January speed cycle, we’ve clipped over a dozen highlights together for a sweetheart ‘Valentines Eve’ post chalk full of wireless news goodies collected over the last little while, just for you after the jump.

Year of the Pig Shaping up as Golden

What’s this?? … mobs of Flying Ketai Pigs..?

Actually, 2007 promises to be far more interesting than even that cheeky title! Here goes our official WWJ Fearless Forecast for 2007 – all in one – huge – breath!

2007 promises to be far more interesting than even that cheeky title! Here goes our official WWJ Fearless Forecast for 2007 – all in one – huge – breath! M-commerce: The carriers? FeliCa-based services will continue to grab serious market share. At the end of 2006, DoCoMo had over 1 mln customers for their DCMX mobile credit-card service alone, not to mention the 18.3 mn regular FeliCa handsets in use as of 31 December. KDDI and SoftBank have FeliCa user bases in the millions as well.. grab a cuppa for after the jump!

KDDI Unveils 10 New 3G Cellphones for Spring 2007

KDDI Unveils 10 New 3G Cellphones for Spring 2007 by Mobikyo KK

KDDI announced their spring 2007 handset line-up this week with ten new 3G models focused on form and function. The latest addition to their Au Design Project, the Media Skin concept by Tokujin Yoshioka, was introduced along with this announcement that it will go on display with earlier offerings – the Infobar, Talby and Neon – at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

The other models on deck are coming from Toshiba (W51T and W52T), Casio (W51CA), Sanyo (W51SA), Kyocera (W51K), Hitachi (W51H), Sony Ericsson (W51S), the second-ever model from Sharp (W51SH) – a popular design originally introduced by Vodafone in spring 2006 (and also recently available from DoCoMo) – plus a first-time offer by top-tier maker Panasonic (W51P).

The W52T, a candybar slider with a wide VGA 480×800 resolution 3-inch screen, a 3.2-megapixel camera and 1GB of on-board memory [.jpg image] stood out as quite impressive during our quick test drive. An immediate and interesting observation is that eight of the ten handsets are 1 Seg digital-TV enabled, which should clearly signal (pardon the pun) that KDDI is bullish on broadcast TV content and services. Otherwise, most have the FeliCa mobile wallet function and the usual goodies such as GPS, PC Site Viewer, Hello Messenger and – of course – all units are running on BREW and come with the EZ suite of mobile content (books, games, auctions etc.) and are LISMO music ready.

The carriers and handset makers are pumping full blast with mobile number portability pushing everyone to improve and deliver better product offering. DoCoMo also announced ten new phones this week while SoftBank is expected to introduce their line-up soon as well. March is traditionally the busiest handset replacement month of the year in Japan, as the new academic and fiscal year begins April 1st; we’ll be looking forward to the official TCA subscriber results.

KDDI Unveils 10 New 3G Cellphones for Spring 2007 by Mobikyo KK