| Japanese cellphone trends presage converged mobile future |
Jun. 10, 2005
Mobile phones will evolve from communication tools to integrated communication devices, media terminals, credit cards, and remote controls, according to a report from telecom research firm Berg Insight. The report examines the world's most advanced mobile market, Japan, for clues about where the industry might be headed.
According to Berg Insight Analyst Sabine Ehlers, the most significant trend in the Japanese mobile phone market is the emergence of the phone as a ubiquitous tool for "most personal electronic needs." Phones travel everywhere with users, Ehlers says, and service providers have created services that enable phones to be used to pay, check in, enter, and travel, just by waving the phone in front of sensors.
For example, in Japan, 30 million handsets with contactless chips have been used to pay for items in seven million shops, Ehlers notes. Meanwhile, a music download service launched in November of last year has already racked up five million song downloads.
 According to the Berg Insight report, phones are available in Japan with FM receivers and transmitters, TV capabilities, GPS systems, and safety features such as child location trackers and one-button alarms. Additionally, phones there can remotely control and view images from cameras, robots (such as the Sony "ROB-1" pictured at right), and other electronics devices.
3G (broadband-like Internet access) was introduced in Japan in 2001, and has 30 million subscribers to date, with the "killer application" driving adoption being "Content produced by the subscribers themselves and forwarded among friends and family," Ehlers says. She adds, "New features were quickly applied to personalize email messages and edit media contents, and periphery products were used to print or transfer them."
The Japanese mobile phone industry has been working on 4G technology for several years, and has initiated field trials, Ehlers says, adding that the Japanese mobile phone industry's long-term vision is for phones to provide a way of connecting to an increasing number of intelligent, connected devices in the everyday world. She adds that mobile phone progress in Japan has raised technical, ethical, and social challenges that are currently being debated and discussed "in all IT-related organizations and forums around Japan."
Further details about the report are available here.
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