Qualcomm
Qualcomm

Qualcomm

KDDI to Study Qualcomm's MediaFlo

KDDI will establish a planning firm to study the potential of alternate mobile TV broadcasting business opportunities with Qualcomm Japan, according to press release posted today. The joint venture, headed by President and Representative Director Masuda Kazuhiko, will launch on 27 December with 10 employees. Media Flow Japan, will be capitalized at 10 million yen, of which 80 percent will be put up by KDDI and 20 percent by Qualcomm. The joint venture will ask the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry for a frequency assignment after considering the profitability and service contents of the new business, as well as targeting a possible start date in late 2006.

Japan Approves Three New Groups for 3G

Japan Approves Three New 3G CarriersBack in 1999, when I was editing Computing Japan magazine, we ran an article entitled “Third Generation Mobile: Three Groups for 3G” looking at the three groups — NTT DoCoMo, IDO-DDI (later, with KDD, KDDI) and IMT-2000 Planning Corp. (later J-Phone) — lining up for a new license. The prediction was that “success for the 3G business depends on the digital content.” Now, 7 years later, three new hopefuls are lining up in a far more mature market, and not only content but also terminals, churn, number portability and voice versus data will be significant factors.

On November 10, Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications said it would grant three new carriers licenses to operate in the 1.7 and 2 GHz bands; BB Mobile of Softbank Corp. and e-mobile of eAccess Ltd. will offer services based on W-CDMA technology while IPMobile Inc. will offer Japan’s first TD-CDMA-based services. The three are expected to launch later in 2006.

The three newcomers are entering a highly competitive market dominated by three existing incumbents: NTT DoCoMo Inc., KDDI Corp. and Vodafone K.K., which reported a collective 89.4 million subscribers as of October 31. The new players are expected to expand the variety of wireless services and pricing levels available, providing more choice and lowering costs — not least of all for terminals — according to one ministry quotation.

DoCoMo Announces Japan's First Digital Broadcast Cellphone

DoCoMo Announces Japan's First Digital Broadcast CellphoneDoCoMo has developed their first mobile handset to receive terrestrial digital broadcasting and analog TV in one 3G Foma package. The P901iTV handset, by Panasonic, targets the start of mobile digital broadcasting in April, 2006 and will make its public debut at the upcoming CEATEC Japan 2005 trade show October 4 to 8 at Makuhari Messe convention center in Chiba. (WWJ will be on-hand to get photos and video!)

The twist-style handset comes with a 2.5-inch, wide-view main LCD screen plus a sub-display, antenna-embedded earphone for enhanced TV reception, and 2.2-megapixel camera. The handset can only handle around 2.5 hours of continuous digital TV viewing; 1.5 hours of analog — ruling out Lord of the Rings style 3-hour viewing marathons. DoCoMo’s Osaifu-Keitai mobile wallet is part of the package as well, enabling the phone to be used as electronic money.

Vodafone and KDDI have had demonstration models of terrestrial digital TV receiver/handsets for some time. Last may their latest versions were up and running at the NHK Science and Technical Research Laboratories open house. Vodafone displayed the 801SH Sharp CDMA Qualcomm handset with a hybrid split-screen displaying TV images on the upper half with the bottom reserved for scrolling data feeds. KDDI showed off a similar au prototype handset by Sanyo. Check-out our video report from that event here.

DoCoMo Planning Push To Talk Service

DoCoMo Planning Push To Talk ServiceRumours are circulating that NTT DoCoMo will introduce a Push-to-Talk (PTT) voice service by mid-October. Several Japanese trade journals have reported the as-yet-unconfirmed plans, saying that DoCoMo plans to market a cellular phone equipped with a chip made by US Qualcomm in October. With three new carriers set to enter the domestic market in 2006, the dominant telco is said to be considering how to defend its market share by offering new services and incentives. Opinions suggest the company will respond to the popular, though as yet still not widely used, flat-rate voice services launched by Willcom in May this year and the family free-call trial running on Vodafone from July through the end of October.

Amp'd Mobile Acquires NINJA's BREW

Amp’d Mobile announced its acquisition of NINJA Mobile’s development division, which will become a part of Amp’d Mobile while NINJA focuses on expanding its mobile publishing business. The acquisition includes NINJA’s esteemed United States and Japanese development teams and NINJA’s “Rope Platform” technology. NINJA’s Rope Platform is the base upon which the Amp’d community, blogging, dating, commerce, multiplayer gaming, location-based and additional server-driven applications, are being built.

Namco Ports RidgeRacer for BREW

EZweb gamers can rejoice in spending about $5 to download and burn RidgeRacer rubber now that Namco has made the popular title compatible with Qualcomm’s BREW platform. While apparently only available for the new W31SA at launch, no doubt it’s just a matter of time for it to become more widely available across KDDI’s WIN handset fleet… and then… The World! We also noticed another interesting Namco title, while snooping around their mobile site, called IdolMaster. Talk about RPGs! WWJ members log in for the full skinny!

QUALCOMM and ACCESS Bring i-mode to MSM Chipsets

Collaboration Delivers Rapid Entry to Global i-mode Market for QUALCOMM’s OEM Partners. QUALCOMM Incorporated, pioneer and innovator of Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) and other cutting-edge wireless technologies and ACCESS Co., Ltd., a global provider of mobile content delivery and Internet access technologies, today announced that ACCESS’ i-mode Global Profile, a profile in ACCESS’ NetFront™ Mobile Client Suite, will be supported on QUALCOMM’s Mobile Station Modem™ (MSM™) chipset solutions. The availability of ACCESS’ i-mode Global Profile solution on select MSM chipsets provides device manufacturers with accelerated entry into the global i-mode market and ensures a wide variety of next-generation devices for i-mode operators.

KDDI and Salesforce.com to Launch Free Trial Service in August

KDDI Corporation, Japan’s leading fixed line and mobile phone service carrier and salesforce.com, the market and technology leader in on-demand CRM, today announced a strategic partnership to deliver on-demand mobile CRM solutions for the Japanese market. Known as “salesforce.com Mobile Edition for au,” the innovative joint offering will deliver comprehensive, wireless CRM functionality that enables users to benefit from their salesforce.com data anywhere, anytime using KDDI’s mobile phones and wireless network. Available to salesforce.com Professional Edition and Enterprise Edition subscribers in Japan, the solution enables users to download data from the salesforce.com service to KDDI phones; view, edit and input new data that can be synchronized with salesforce.com; and search data both offline and online.

Digital TV Cell Phone Test Drive

Digital TV Cell Phone Test DriveDigital terrestrial broadcasting for mobile phones is scheduled to begin in Japan by spring 2006 and both Vodafone and KDDI had demonstration models up and running on the first day of the NHK Science and Technical Research Laboratories open house yesterday. An annual event open to the public, this year’s show focused once again on digital TV broadcasting with three floors of cameras, servers, receivers and handheld devices. Mobile receivers drew packed crowds herded into Disneyland-style long lines waiting their turn to handle an 801SH Vodafone/Sharp CDMA Qualcomm handset. No bigger than a conventional cell phone, the 801SH has a hybrid split-screen displaying images on the upper half with the bottom reserved for scrolling data feeds and Web links to programming, etc. Exclusive from Wireless Watch Japan!

QUALCOMM Comples Interoperability Testing on DoCoMo's 3G Network

QUALCOMM Incorporated, pioneer and world leader of Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) digital wireless technology, today announced the successful completion of WCDMA interoperability testing (IOT) on NTT DoCoMo’s 3GPP WCDMA-compliant FOMA network. The IOT began in June 2004 using QUALCOMM’s Mobile Station Modem(TM) (MSM(TM)) MSM6250(TM) chipset and software solution. The successful testing included extensive network performance, standby-time and talk-time evaluations. In addition to the existing interoperability of QUALCOMM’s solutions with global WCDMA networks, the successful conclusion of IOT with DoCoMo ensures that the software for the MSM6250 chipset and all future QUALCOMM WCDMA chipsets will also be fully compatible with the FOMA network.