NEC Electronics Corp. and its subsidiaries in the US and Europe today introduced the industry’s first Pseudo Static Random Access Memory (PSRAM) device [.jpg] designed in accordance with the Common Specifications for Mobile RAM (COSMORAM) Rev. 3, a memory interface standard developed and promoted jointly by Toshiba, Fujitsu, and NEC Electronics for the mobile handset market.
JCNN, 9 November 2004
Toshiba Corporation and ARM have announced that it has licensed the ARM1136J-STM processor. Since 1998, Toshiba has licensed the ARM7TM, ARM9TM, and ARM10TM family processors for numerous applications ranging from mobile communications to consumer electronics. The agreement includes an option for Toshiba to license other ARM11 family processors.
Love comes to the really, really small screen in a mobile, only-in-Japan, soap opera made exclusively for KDDI 3G cellys. The live-action soap opera, Yokohama 80s, follows the predictable lives, loves, and losses of young, beach-loving Japanese boys and girls back when Madonna was still Like a Virgin. Eighties’ big hair, big shoulders, and big hits have been downsized to tiny, two-and-a-half-minute broadcast bites. The story is adapted from Shogakan Shukan’s weekly Big Comic Spirits-series “Tokyo Eighties” (published as a serial manga) but features all-new original characters and storylines by the same author. Can the mobile laundry soap commercials be far behind?
IT researcher and consulting firm Gartner Japan has announced sales in Japan of cellular phones between January and June. Sales reached 22,133,100 units, down 8.5% over the same period last year. The company attributes the decline in sales to the fact that demand for camera phones was not as brisk as a year ago. Gartner also reports that W-CDMA phones accounted for almost 15% of total cellphone sales.
With KDDI’s May 2004 announcement that they had developed handsets with embedded digital TV tuners and ample battery life, and with NHK, Mobile Broadcasting Corp., and others promising direct-to-mobile broadcasts, TV is again being widely touted as the “next big thing” for the mobile platform — and not just in Japan. But before we truly see an era of television-keitai convergence, several critical issues must be understood and addressed. Many of these are fundamental flaws in the concept of mobile phone-TV convergence, and suggest that we are simply witnessing the introduction of the “next big hype” for the mobile platform.
(Part 1 of a two-part series. Next week: Mobile TV Rocks!, by WWJ chief editor Daniel Scuka.)
Three of Japan’s major electronics manufacturers have agreed on a standard interface specification for a type of memory in 3G mobile phones that will allow the companies to use a common component design to help phones function better. The companies will begin production of memory parts based on the specification in March 2005, according to a statement.
