The new AH-H407P PC card [.jpg image] made for DDI Pocket by Honda Electron [Press Release] is set to start selling in Japan on September 10. It appears they will offer a flat-rate monthly fee for the 128-kbps PHS connection, which (if true) would mean we’ll be lining up to get one for ourselves. It could well provide a real challenge to the existing carriers’ 3G data-card pricing strategy.
Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd., best known for its Panasonic brand of consumer electronic and digital communications products, today announced it has developed a new multimedia processor-based platform. The platform, that is to be applied to a wide range of digital appliances including mobile phones and audiovisual equipment, facilitates software development of digital consumer electronics and improves productivity and software design. The new platform can accelerate the speed products are introduced to the market by more than five times the current rate, develop higher sound and image quality, lower power consumption, fortify security, and enhance responsiveness.
NTT DoCoMo, Inc., Motorola Inc. and Motorola Japan Ltd. announced today that they have signed an agreement to jointly develop a FOMA handset targeting business users by taking advantage of high-speed 3G FOMA technologies. Commercialization is scheduled for spring 2005. The new handset, which is compatible with GSM/GPRS technologies, will be the first FOMA model that may be used outside of Japan. Unlike i-mode®-capable phones, the handset will enable access to the internet through mopera® or any other available internet connection service. What’s more, its browser will be able to display standard web pages. Full Press Release Here.
NEC Corporation today announced that NEC Telecommunications (China), a new company and a business entity established in May 2004 to actively pursue mobile solution business in China, introduced a new branding strategy “Get Personal” (Chinese-English translation) to further expand its mobile business in China. Along with the campaign, NEC reveals its new strategy to enter into the mid-low range product market segment to appeal to a wider range of consumers in China. The three N10X series of products with seven color variations, which are also being announced today, are one of the key products for the new strategy.
NTT DoCoMo Inc. and its eight regional subsidiaries announced that they will add English language capability to the i-mode® Disaster Message Board service beginning September 1, 2004. DoCoMo set up this electronic bulletin board service in Japanese last January, to be activated in the event of a major calamity such as a high-magnitude earthquake. The bulletin board will enable i-mode subscribers within the disaster area to post messages in order to notify family and friends of their personal safety and whereabouts. The service was launched in order to ensure communication and prevent a degradation in network performance, since an overflow of voice calls and data packet transmissions would likely follow a major disaster.
The Mobidec 2004 annual event is back for their 4th year, slated to run Aug. 26 – 27th in Tokyo’s Aoyama Diamond Hall. Discover the future for fusion of cybermoney, music distribution, rich contents, and broadcast. As the cellular phone and mobile web usage are increasingly expanding, this two day seminar will explore the affects of the wireless domain on the real economy. The key players in Japan’s cellular phone business and technology sectors will make presentations, and display company exhibits, of their unique experiance in this field.
