Category: Mobile

  • GPS required for mobile phones in Japan from April 2007

    Japan’s Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry (Soumusho) is working to change regulations so that GPS is required on Japan’s mobile phones from April 2007. This move has been expected for some time, but apparently details will be announced later in 2005. Nikkei reports that the accuracy of the location determination should be on the order…

  • KDDI absorbs TuKa

    KDDI absorbs TuKa

    KDDI – Japan’s second largest telecom operator – streamlines the group KDDI’s AU with TuKa acquires 3.5 million additional subscribers KDDI announced to absorb the three TuKa companies into AU: with the stroke of a pen, AU will be stronger by 3.5 million subscribers. The three TuKa companies managed a successful turnround by focusing on…

  • Wireless Japan 2005 Show (July 13-15, 2005 in Tokyo)

    Wireless Japan 2005 Show (July 13-15, 2005 in Tokyo)

    Six years into the wireless internet revolution which started February 1999 in Japan Docomo’s and KDDI’s latest wireless innovation, concept mobile phones, mobile payments Wireless Japan 2005 marks six years of mobile internet in Japan, which started February 1999 in Tokyo. Now in the sixth year, wireless internet, i-Mode and EZweb and J-Sky are maturing,…

  • QR codes everywhere

    QR codes are everywhere in Tokyo – they have become probably one of the most important input tools for mobile phones… We published our brand-new QR code report today Copyright·©1997-2013 ·Eurotechnology Japan KK·All Rights Reserved·

  • Mobile operators invest US$ 15 billion

    Japan’s top three mobile operators DoCoMo, KDDI and Vodafone announced plans to invest about US$ 15 billion during FY 2005 (April 2005 – March 2006): For recent financial data and analysis of Japan’s telecom and mobile sector: Eurotechnology report on Japan’s telecom industries Find details about SoftBank’s acquisition of Vodafone KK (Vodafone’s Japan company) in…

  • Location based services in Japan

    About 20% of mobile phones have GPS in Japan, and both KDDI and DoCoMo are integrating location based services into their mobile internet services EZweb and i-Mode. We completed a report on location based services in Japan Eurotechnology Report on location based services and mapping in Japan. Copyright·©1997-2013 ·Eurotechnology Japan KK·All Rights Reserved·

  • KDDI’s net income increases +71%

    On April 28, 2005 KDDI‘s CEO Tadashi Onodera, announced spectacular results for the financial year April 2004 – March 2005. Net income increased by 71% and KDDI announced approximately US$ 4 Billion in investment capital expenditure for the financial year 2006 (April 2005 – March 2005). We prepared a 230 page analysis of KDDI’s businesses…

  • Chaku-Uta-Full: 5 million mobile music downloads in Japan

    Chaku-Uta-Full: 5 million mobile music downloads in Japan

    KDDI pioneers full lengths mobile music song downloads via 3G Chaku Uta Full achieves 5 million downloads by April 3, 2005 KDDI/AU announced that 5 Millions Chaku-Uta-Full songs have been downloaded until April 3, 2005. Download our 230 page analysis of KDDI/AU Download our “mobile music” report Note added: on June 15, 2005, KDDI reported…

  • Japan’s mobile subscriber data for March 2005

    March is the month when new subscriptions peak in Japan. During March 2005 around one million new subscribers signed up for mobile services in Japan, the net gain (new subscriptions minus cancellations) was 930,500. New subscribers were shared as follows between carriers: DoCoMo: + 480,200 (+ 51.6%) KDDI/AU: + 436,100 (+ 46.9%) WILLCOM: + 33,300…

  • e-Access and Lucent announce HSDPA tests in Japan

    e-Access Chairman & CEO, Sachio Semmoto and Lucent Chairman & CEO Patricia Russo on March 30, 2005 in Tokyo, explained their joint tests of HSDPA services in Tokyo. e-Access is preparing to enter Japan’s mobile communications industry with the brand “e-Mobile”, and is currently conducting tests with Lucent and Fujitsu as equipment providers. Former US…

  • Japan mobile subscriber data for Feb 2005

    Japan’s mobile subscriber numbers for Feb 2005 came out yesterday… DoCoMo is ahead again after a soft period on the strength of services and handsets, and KDDI/AU is still going strong driven by the designer series, good tariffs/discounts, music, WIN etc. Willcom (the former DDI-Pocket) is strengthening under new management, new name and new campaigns…

  • Chaku-uta-full: 3 million mobile music downloads

    Chaku-uta-full: 3 million mobile music downloads

    Japan is the pioneer of mobile music Ringing tones and mobile music are pioneered in Japan Put until mid-2004, cumulatively KDDI (Japan’s No. 2 mobile operator) sold more “chaku-uta” mobile music song clips in Japan alone than Apple sold music via iTunes globally. This fact shows both the power of mobile music, and also the…

  • Vodafone CEO Arun Sarin wants Vodafone to be in Japan for 10, 20, 30 years

    Vodafone CEO Arun Sarin wants Vodafone to be in Japan for 10, 20, 30 years

    Shiro Tsuda, 津田志郎, CEO of Vodafone Japan Vodafone CEO Arun Sarin wants to stay in Japan for the long term according to Bloomberg by Gerhard Fasol In February 2005 Shiro Tsuda (津田志郎, CEO of Vodafone KK for a few weeks) told Bloomberg that global “Vodafone CEO Arun Sarin wants Vodafone in Japan for 10, 20,…

  • Vodafone’s challenges in Japan: Businessweek and Economist analyze the facts

    Vodafone’s challenges in Japan: Businessweek and Economist analyze the facts

    Vodafone’s challenges in Japan’s advanced telecommunications markets catch attention Will Vodafone stay in Japan or give up and pull out? Vodafone’s challenges in Japan: BusinessWeek and The Economist both analyze and comment on Vodafone’s business situation in Japan, where the mobile internet was first implemented successfully starting in February 1999, far earlier than anywhere else…

  • Financials: DoCoMo, KDDI, Vodafone

    The following figure compares Sales (Financial year ending March 31, 2004), Net profits after taxes(Financial year ending March 31, 2004), and market capitalization (as of February 17, 2005) for DoCoMo, KDDI and Vodafone (in each case consolidated for the global company): Copyright·©1997-2013 ·Eurotechnology Japan KK·All Rights Reserved·

  • PENCK (KDDI-AU Designer Series)

    PENCK (KDDI-AU Designer Series)

    KDDI/AU Designer Series Model PENCK designed by Makoto Saito Design Office Inc. Today, February 18, KDDI-AU introduced PENCK – the latest model in the Designer Series, designed by Makoto Saito Design Office Inc.: Designer: Makoto Saito Design Office Inc. Data rate = 2.4 Mbps Music = Chaku-Uta-Full, stereo speakers Camera = 1.24 Megapixel, incl QR…

  • Amazon.co.jp captures mobile purchases directly inside competing brick-and-mortar stores with barcode i-appli

    Amazon.co.jp captures mobile purchases directly inside competing brick-and-mortar stores with barcode i-appli

    Amazon.co.jp introduced a barcode reader i-Appli (JAVA application for DoCoMo’s i-Mode phones), with which shoppers in brick-and-mortar stores can directly compare the prices with Amazon.co.jp’s mobile webstore prices. If the shopper prefers, he/she can order directly by i-Mode mobile phone from Amazon.co.jp online while still standing in front of the shelves of the brick-and-mortar store.…

  • Music on mobile – as a killer application

    Music on mobile – as a killer application

    More Chaku-Uta mobile music downloads by KDDI in Japan than by Apple’s iTunes globally Turns out that music is a killer application on mobile – we are working on a number of projects in the mobile music field. We just completed our “Mobile Music Japan” report. With an incredibly much smaller potential customer base KDDI/AU…

  • Scenarios for Japan’s mobile eco-systems (for Finland’s technology agency TEKES)

    Finland’s Government R&D and technology agency TEKES engaged our company to prepare input for the planning of TEKES’ five year VAMOS project on mobile services. Download one of our reports entitled “Scenarios for Japan’s mobile eco-systems” from the TEKES website Copyright·©1997-2013 ·Eurotechnology Japan KK·All Rights Reserved·

  • Cisco-VP: "In the future Internet business models will come from Japan"

    In today’s Wallstreet Journal (Dec 7, 2004), Mike Volpi, Senior VP of CISCO’s routing technology group, is quoted as saying: “In the past the internet business models, technologies and applications were all coming from the US, but today, through broadband, Japan is about to become the number one country in the area of Internet. In…

  • Marc Newson designed Talby concept phone announced by KDDI

    Marc Newson designed Talby concept phone announced by KDDI

    KDDI Design Project (today branded iida) Marc Newson designed Talby concept phone for Japan’s mobile operator KDDI – au On 13 October 2004, KDDI/AU announced “talby”, the third phone in their “AU design series”. Volume sales start in December 2004. We expect that “talby” will be similarly successful as “infobar” one year ago. “talby” is…

  • Update on Prepaid Phones in Japan

    According to newsreports, Japan’s ruling coalition decided on a draft law, which will make identification requirements for obtaining prepaid phones more strict, instead of totally outlawing prepaid phones. It is reported that according to this bill the transfer of mobile phones to third parties would become a punishable offence. So if this bill becomes law,…

  • Interview with Businessweek Editor David Rocks about Masayoshi Son and Japan’s telecom sector

    Interview with Businessweek Editor David Rocks about Masayoshi Son and Japan’s telecom sector

    Businessweek Editor David Rocks: “if you would meet Masayoshi Son, what would you ask him? by Gerhard Fasol Businessweek Editor David Rocks came three weeks to Japan to report on Japan’s telecommunications and technology sectors, arrived Friday and took me for dinner Friday night. A few days later David Rocks called me during my lunch…

  • Prepaid phones to be outlawed in Japan (see update below!)

    The government coalition in Japan is preparing a law to outlaw prepaid mobile phones. The reason given is that too many prepaid phones are used for crimes, e.g. the “ore ore” fraud. The number of prepaid phones in Japan is very small, but it’s not equally distributed. DoCoMo has almost no prepaid users, and has…

  • SonyEricsson design team presentation & discussion

    The SonyEricsson mobile phone design team gave a very impressive presentation of their work at the Swedish Embassy yesterday. Here is Art Director Mr Kawagoi, who created the famous SonyEricsson logo, explaining the messages contained in his creation: Here Swedish Managers of the SonyEricsson Creative Design Center from Lund/Sweden: My conclusion: expect a lot more…

  • Version 8 of the "i-Mode report"

    Completed version 8 of the “i-Mode Report” (260 pages, 45 figures, 120 photographs, and 25 tables) Main changes and additions: updated most statistics and graphs added a section on mobile games on i-mode updated the international section updated the 3G section updated the i-mode-FeliCa wallet-phone section corrected many errorsupdated the section on Japan’s telecom landscape:…

  • Ig Nobel Prize for Peace to the inventor of Karaoke

    Ig Nobel Prize for Peace to the inventor of Karaoke

    There is a saying the that the Prophet is not recognized within his/her own country – and I think that the inventor of Karaoke, Inoue Daisuke (井上 大佑) is not as famous in his own country as he deserves – but he was now recognized for his outstanding invention by the “Ig Nobel Prize” committee…

  • Vodafone not so big in Japan – The Economist says

    Vodafone not so big in Japan – The Economist says

    The Economist looks at Vodafone’s real situation in Japan’s very advanced and hyper-competitive telecommunications market Vodafone not so big in Japan: Vodafone is struggling to catch up with Docomo’s introduction of 3G in Japan An article in The Economist about Vodafone is partly based on our analysis: Vodafone not so big in Japan: “Vodafone- Not…

  • Prepaid mobile phones in Japan…

    Prepaid mobile phones are a huge business in Europe. In Japan prepaid mobile phone numbers are tiny, and NTT’s new CEO just announced that NTT-DoCoMo is planning to stop offering prepaid mobile phones altogether. Find detailed statistics and market shares per operator for Japan’s prepaid market in our report on Japan’s telecommunications sector. Copyright·©1997-2013 ·Eurotechnology…

  • Cable & Wireless Japan acquired by Softbank???!!

    Cable & Wireless Japan acquired by Softbank???!!

    Cable & Wireless Japan staged what it said was one of the first “hostile” takeovers in Japan, but then proved to be unable to manage the company they had acquired by Gerhard Fasol On October 26, 2004, Softbank announced the acquisition of Cable & Wireless IDC for YEN 12.3 billion (= US$ 110 million) Cable…