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Wireless Watch Japan's Web Video Triple Play

Wireless Watch Japan’s Web Video Triple PlayIt’s been a fairly hectic six weeks for Japan’s mobile industry and therefore also for us here at WWJ. Starting with the Tokyo Game Show here in late September, followed in short order by CEATEC and DoCoMo’s new 903i-series launch — and combined with the MNP (mobile number portability) official launch on 24 October — it’s been crazy.

Your WWJ staff have also been deep into planning next week’s Mobile Intelligence Japan (MIJ) mission, due to start on Sunday afternoon and we have over 250 folks registered for our next Mobile Monday event at the Canadian embassy on Monday 13 November! Phew!

We know how much everyone enjoys watching our web video programs and so we’ve bundled a few together that were finally produced over the last little while. The Tokyo Game Show was, as always and then some, a super event this year, celebrating their 10th anniversary and was held at Makuhari Messe; WWJ saw previews of DoCoMo’s 903i “Mega Games” while KDDI was running a massive (mobile) multiplayer Bomberman exhibit and SoftBank Mobile stepped out if full force with a wide selection of games targeted at Sharp’s 905SH handset.

Also, we have added our video coverage from DoCoMo’s new 903i-series launch, which introduced a whopping 14 new handsets complete with some interesting 3G data service upgrades as well.

Finally, DoubleClick Japan introduced their “Mobile MK” software and were kind enough to show us a full demo. — Yoroshiku!

KDDI's Aggressive EV-DO Upgrade

The CDMA Development Group (CDG) has reported that KDDI is strengthening its technological and differentiated services lead in Japan by upgrading its CDMA network to so-called Revision A. Rev A’s most compelling benefit will be a dramatic increase in uplink speeds up to 1.8 Mbps and downlink speeds up to 3.1 Mbps, as compared to EV-DO Release 0 that supports speeds up to 153.6 kbps and 2.4Mbps, respectively. KDDI has already announced the availability of two handsets from Toshiba, the W47T and DRAPE, to support the commercial launch of its advanced broadband technology services by December 2006.

KDDI Wins October Subscriber War

KDDI Corp. appears to have benefited the most from the mobile phone number portability service introduced Oct. 24 to allow people to switch phone companies without changing their numbers. KDDI said Wednesday that it had a net 200,500 new subscribers in October, market leader DoCoMo saw its subscribers increase by only 40,800 while Softbank Mobile said its subscribers increased by 23,800.

October MNP – Early Results

Japan mobile industry watchers are awaiting the official October stats from the Telecom Carriers Assoc. (TCA) to be posted this week. Considering the figures already announced by both DoCoMo and KDDI at the end of October it would seem that mobile number portability has – as predicted – provided KDDI the most benefit so far. However, after a quick calculation based on the information already available, SoftBank Mobile may well be in the news as a result of what would appear to be rather ‘disappointing’ numbers.

MySpace to launch in Japan with Softbank

joint venture with Japanese Internet and telecoms group Softbank Corp. The 50-50 venture, to be called MySpace Japan, will first offer services for personal computers and will eventually allow users to post photos and write blogs via mobile phones. The firms are expected to announce the deal as early as this week after a meeting between News Corp. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Rupert Murdoch and Softbank CEO Masayoshi Son. The Japanese version of MySpace is live here however there is still no official announcement from Softbank. [Update: it’s official — Eds]

KDDI Unveils New Concept Models

The KDDI Designing Studio in Harajuku has 4 new concept handsets, including the next version of their popular InfoBar series, on display in their main-floor exhibit space. The so-called InfoBar 2 – although it’s the third version we’ve seen? – comes in 5 colors and has a cool speaker system built into the re-charger cradle. The companies AU Design Project continues to set the pace for future model development, if you’re in Tokyo the exhibition runs through 16 November.