Mobile phone sales drop by 29% in Japan in 2008

According to MM Research Institute, the cellphone shipments decreased by 29.3% YoY in Japan in 2008, totaling in 35.8 million units. Sharp was leading the pack for four years consecutively, shipping over 8 million handsets last year. International players failed to make a big impact in 2008, grouped in the Other category where Apple iPhone and HTC Diamond were notoriously visible. The 2009 outlook doesn't look bright as the handset shipments are expected to drop by another 7.5% hitting the low of 33.2 million units.

Source: MM Research Institute via Keitai Watch

In Japan, 60% have no idea what Android is

With the growing anticipation of the launch of HTC G1, the first Android based mobile device to be released this week in the US by T-Mobile, Japan’s market research firm iShare conducted an online survey of 422 respondents between 20 and 40 years old to measure the awareness of Android in Japan.

The results are very telling and not that surprising. The majority of respondents (60%) have never heard about Android, with another 25.6% knowing only the Android’s name.

Well-known among early adopters and techies Android will face its greatest challenge of winning the hearts of consumers. It will be interesting to see how T-Mobile USA intends to differentiate the first Android device from HTC, a very unimpressive piece of hardware (from a design point of view). It doesn’t have much space for maneuver. The looks and price are often the deciding factors in user’s choice of the mobile phone. And after iPhone, the appeal of smooth Web experience may not be that new and enough to get attention from end-users.

Source: iShare 

HTC aims for 5% of Japan mobile handset market

This week HTC held a press conference in Japan to share its vision and strategy of tackling Japan mobile handset market and also to mark the launch of HTC Touch Pro and HTC Touch Diamond devices along with Touch FLO 3D user interface. 

HTC's outlook for Japanese operations is positive with optimistic goal to grab 5% of domestic unit shipments in near future. HTC will need to ship about 2.6 million devices annually in order to achieve its 5% goal (annual handset shipments in Japan reached 52.3m in 2007, according to Gartner).

HTC's confidence is based on global success of HTC Touch smartphone, which sold in almost 3 million devices from its launch in 2007. The new and enhanced Touch-based models Touch Pro and Touch Diamond should drive more sales, according to HTC. Having launched HTC Diamond in May 2008, HTC reports global sales of 1 million devices with the forecast of 3 million shipments by the end of October 2008.

Along with new devices, HTC also refined its strategy in Japan, including the following moves:

• Target multiple carriers by shipping HTC Touch Diamond to DoCoMo, Softbank, and eMobile and HTC Pro to DoCoMo, KDDI au, and Softbank
• Provide a thorough localization for Japanese carriers enabling carrier-specific email, menus, text input, navigation apps in Japanese
• Bring HTC's latest handsets to Japan in timely fashion (in sync with global launch)...

Source: IT Media +D Mobile

eMobile starts voice service, releases eMonster terminal

eMobile finally enters the mobile voice market in Japan with two handsets from HTC and Toshiba scheduled for official launch in March 28. HTC’s device called EMONSTER S11HT is a Windows Mobile 6 smartphone with a QWERTY keyboard and unlocked SIM card, which makes it possible to be used abroad with a local SIM card. Toshiba’s handset is a voice-centric clamshell with one-seg TV tuner inside.

EMONSTER Specs
Model:	S11HT EMONSTER
Carrier:	eMobile
Maker:	HTC
Price:	TBD
Form factor:	PDA-centric clamshell
Color variations:	grey metallic
Weight:	190g
Dimensions:	59 X 112 X 19mm
Main display:	2.8" QVGA TFT LCD (touchscreen)
Talk time:	up to 264 minutes
Standby time:	up to 350 hours
Platform / OS:	Windows Mobile 6 Pro Edition
Memory:	N/A
Memory card slot:	microSD (SD2.0) X 1
GPS / Location:	Yes (Mobile Google Maps, Navitime)
Bluetooth:	2.0 + EDR
Infrared:	N/A
USB:	miniUSB (2.0 Full Speed)
Wi-Fi:	802.11 b/g
Camera:	3MP (main with autofocus) + VGA (sub)
Video calling:	Yes
One-seg TV:	No
Music player:	Yes
Browser:	IE Mobile
Cellular radio:	HSDPA/WCDMA (1700MHz)
Mobile Wallet:	No
QR-code:	N/A
Other:	MS Office Document viewer, QWERTY keyboard

Toshiba H11T Specs
Model:	H11T
Carrier:	eMobile
Maker:	Toshiba
Price:	TBD
Form factor:	Clamshell
Color variations:	white, blue, black, pink
Weight:	160g
Dimensions:	50 X 104 X 17.9mm
Main display:	2.8" Wide QVGA LCD (240 X 400)
Talk time:	approx. 160 minutes
Standby time:	approx. 350 hours
Platform / OS:	N/A
Memory:	approx. 50MB
Memory card slot:	microSD (sold separately)
GPS / Location:	N/A
Bluetooth:	A2DP compatible
Infrared:	IrMC 1.1
USB:	N/A
Wi-Fi:	No
Camera:	3.2MP (autofocus/ anti-shake)
Video calling:	No
One-seg TV:	Yes (Toshiba REGZA TV technology)
Music player:	Yes (AAC/MP3/WMA)
Browser:	Full HTML NetFront browser
Email:	NetFront Messaging client
Mobile Wallet:	No
QR-code:	Yes
Other:	Access NetFront Mobile Client Suite (JV-Lite 2, etc.)

Source: eMobile press release (Japanese)