Softbank (TYO:9984) offered $20 billion for mobile telco Sprint Nextel (NYSE:S) last year, but the deal is not yet done as it goes through regulatory inspection. While the acquisition is under scrutiny, today the satellite-TV provider Dish Network (NASDAQ:DISH) hijacked the deal by offering a $25.5 billion bid, part cash and stocks, for Sprint.

“We think we’ve made an offer that’s much more compelling than the Softbank transaction,” said Dish chairman Charles Ergen today in New York. Dish reckons that its proposal is worth 13 percent more to Sprint shareholders than the offer made by Softbank.

Softbank CEO and founder Masayoshi Son has huge aspirations in this Sprint deal. Even before the deal was sealed, Son proclaimed that Sprint and Softbank combined will make Softbank Group the third largest telco in the world in terms of revenue. Son said back in October:

This transaction provides an excellent opportunity for Softbank to leverage its expertise in smartphones and next-generation high-speed networks, including LTE, to drive the mobile Internet revolution in the world’s largest market. As we have proven in Japan, we have achieved a V-shaped earnings recovery in the acquired mobile business and grown dramatically by introducing differentiated products and innovative services to an incumbent-led market. Our track record of innovation, combined with Sprint’s strong brand and local leadership, provides a constructive beginning toward creating a more competitive American mobile market.

This is apparently a huge blow to Softbank’s overseas expansion and American dream. But given Son’s ambition and winning mentality, you can be assured that Softbank will not give up without a fight.

(Source: Wall Street Journal)

This is big: Japanese telecommunications giant SoftBank (TYO:9984) (the one that acquired Sprint in the US) will launch a tender offer to increase its stake in game studio GungHo Online Entertainment (3765.OS) between April 1 and 26 this year. the deal will be worth over a quarter of a billion dollars. It’s timed to coincide with GungHo conducting a 10-for-1 share split on April 1.

GungHo has produced Puzzle and Dragons, Japan’s most popular smartphone game with over 10 million users. It’s perhaps the most profitable mobile game worldwide, estimated to rack up well over US$50 million per month currently.

A few days ago, GungHo’s market cap reached a mind-blowing $5 billion – more than that of GREE or Mobage operator DeNA.

SoftBank (or SoftBank Mobile, to be more specific) will acquire 6.4 percent of GungHo’s total shares for 25 billion yen ($264 million). With that investment, the telco’s stake in the Puzzle and Dragons maker increases from 33.6 to 58.5 percent.

SoftBank explains:

With this understanding, the company recognized the importance of enhancing mobile content by combining smartphone-focused development capability and infrastructure held by the SoftBank Mobile Group and planning and creating capability in the smartphone game industry held by the target company group to further improve the efficiency in operation of the mobile communications business, profitability and competitiveness.

After the execution of the deal, GungHo will become a SoftBank subsidiary.

SoftBank acquires the shares from a company called Asian Grooves, which is owned by Taizo Son – who is the brother of SoftBank CEO and founder Masayoshi Son (Taizo Son is also chairman at GungHo).

New mobile subscriber figures from Japan’s Telecom Carriers Association show that the country’s leading carrier, NTT Docomo (NYSE:DCM), dropped 40,800 customers in November, sliding from 60.79 million in October to 60.75 million. At first glance, it would seem that rival carriers Softbank and Au performed comparatively well in November, and indeed over the last few months – thanks in large part to the fact that both carry Apple’s iPhone 5, which launched back in September – they have done ok.

In the chart below, you can see the amount of subscribers that each carrier has added per month over the past year. But it’s important to keep in mind that most of Docomo’s new subscribers over the past year have been on its shiny new LTE service, which is reported separately by the TCA. And if you factor those into the equation, then Docomo has been doing great (even without the iPhone), adding 678,000 subscribers for the month of November [1]. The chart shows Docomo’s aggregate subscriber additions in red (without LTE shown in pink), alongside the aggregate numbers reported for Softbank and Au by the TCA.

according to TCA figures

Docomo’s LTE service surpassed the seven million subscriber mark in November (7,394,200 to be exact), which gives it pretty strong growth since its Xi service originally became available back in late 2010.

Softbank and KDDI just recently began selling the cellular model of the iPad Mini on November 30, so it’ll be interesting to see how that affects subscriptions for December.

Kyodo is reporting that Japanese carriers Softbank (TSE:9984) and KDDI (TYO:9433) say they will launch Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) new iPad Mini with cellular connectivity one week from today, on Friday, November 30th. The wi-fi only model previously launched in Apple stores back on November 2nd in Japan.

Softbank and KDDI will also start selling the fourth generation iPad on Friday.

Both companies had a good month in October, especially KDDI which added a net of 152,700 subscribers. In comparison, Softbank managed to add a net of 37,900 subscribers. Both carriers offer the iPhone 5, and have reportedly lured a number of new customers from NTT Docomo which saw a loss of 189,800 subscribers in October.

Docomo is still, by far, the market leader with over 60 million total subscribers.

Softbank's CEO Masayoshi Son, Sprint's CEO Dan Hesse

Softbank (TSE:9984) and Sprint (NYSE:S) held a joint press conference in Tokyo to announce Softbank’s $20 billion investment in Sprint. Masayoshi Son hailed the move as a big step for Softbank to move into the US market, but acknowledged that it was one that comes with some risk, as the deal is financed with loans as well as cash on hand.

This is reportedly the biggest acquisition of any overseas company by a Japanese firm, and the latest example of formerly home-bound Japanese tech companies looking for opportunities abroad. In keeping with that theme, Son took a more global view of what this means for his company, saying that it makes Softbank the third highest carrier in terms of revenue in the world, labeling it as a victory of sorts over domestic rival Docomo.

Son was almost dismissive about the Japanese domestic carrier wars, preferring to focus on Softbank Group’s new position on a global scale. With Softbank and Sprint’s combined $32 billion in revenue (January to June 2012), that puts ‘Softbank Group’ on par with AT&T, just behind China Mobile ($43 billion) and Verizon ($37 billion).

He noted that the US market is an attractive one for Softbank, as it is the world’s largest mobile market with great smartphone growth, and the top ARPU among all nations. In company’s official release (included in full below), Son explained:

This transaction provides an excellent opportunity for Softbank to leverage its expertise in smartphones and next-generation high-speed networks, including LTE, to drive the mobile Internet revolution in the world’s largest market. As we have proven in Japan, we have achieved a V-shaped earnings recovery in the acquired mobile business and grown dramatically by introducing differentiated products and innovative services to an incumbent-led market. Our track record of innovation, combined with Sprint’s strong brand and local leadership, provides a constructive beginning toward creating a more competitive American mobile market.

Son pointed to his company’s track record of turning around companies in trouble, giving Japan Telecom, Vodaphone, and Willcom as examples of companies whose fortunes reversed after coming under the umbrella of Softbank Group.

Dan Hesse, the CEO of Sprint noted that although Sprint was the third largest carrier in the US according to market share (at 16 percent), that it was number one in terms of revenue growth and ARPU growth in comparison to its competitors. He noted that this deal gives Sprint the financial flexibility that it needs for new growth opportunities.

Hesse also noted that it will make the US market more competitive, especially as Sprint can learn from Softbank’s experience and know-how, especially its experience in LTE deployment. Overall, he says that this will result in a “much stronger, better Sprint” and help them reach their goal of being America’s top wireless carrier.

Aquos Phone Xx (photo: blog.goo.ne.jp)

At an event in Tokyo yesterday, Softbank (TSE:9984) announced its 2012 Winter / 2013 Spring smartphone line up. This was a chance for the company to show off its selection of ‘not-iPhones,’ including its new Aquos Phone Xx from Sharp, the Arrows A 201F from Fujitsu, and the Motorola Razr M. All the phones in its new line up (pdf) are compatible with its LTE network.

The most notable new handset is the Aquos Phone Xx which will run on Android 4.1, and is powered by a 1.5 GHz quad core processor. It has a large 4.9 inch display, and a hefty 16.3 megapixel camera as well. Unfortunately, this won’t be going on sale until March of 2013, and there’s no word on price just yet either.

If you’d like to watch Softbank’s press conference in its entirety, it can be streamed here.

As of September, Softbank has surpassed the 30 million subscribers milestone, or about 34 million if you include the newly acquired eMobile. It still sits behind Japan’s leading carrier NTT Docomo (over 60 million) and KDDI’s au (almost 36 million).

[Softbank, via blog.goo.ne.jp]

It has been a big day for acquisitions in Japan. As we previously mentioned, Nexon’s acquisition of social game developer Gloops for $469 million dollars. Surprisingly, that was not the most expensive pickup today, as mobile carrier Softbank’s (TSE:9984) purchase of rival eAccess (TYO:9427) came in at the price of $1.84 billion. Softbank will reportedly pay more than triple eAccess’s trading price in the deal.

Reuters cites Softbank’s Masayoshi Son as saying that this acquisition of eAccess and its eMobile subscribers will bring Softbank’s total subscriber count to 39 million. Although it looks like Son is including Willcom’s 4.7 million subscribers in that total [1]. Willcom was purchased by Softbank back in December of 2010.

KDDI had about 35.9 million subscribers as of the end of August. So if we just look at eAccess’s 4.1 million eMobile subscribers [2], then strictly speaking Softbank Mobile – with its 30.1 million subscribers – still trails KDDI as the nation’s third carrier.

Japan’s leading mobile carrier, of course, is still NTT Docomo with 60.6 million subscribers at the end of August. But the race for second just got a lot more interesting!

Check out our interactive breakdown of Japan’s mobile subscriber numbers below. Figures are according to the Telecommunications Carriers Association. Note that eAccess subsidiary, eMobile, stopped reporting its totals late in 2011.

[Via Reuters]

[Download image version of this chart]

Au store in Ibaraki, Osaka. Photo: sponichi.co.jp

The Wall Street Journal and Japan’s Nikkei are reporting that thieves were the first to get their hands on Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) new iPhone in Japan, just hours before it officially launched in the country.

In Osaka city, a series of robberies resulted in 191 iPhones stolen:

• 33 iPhone 5s were stolen from an Au store in Ibaraki city, Osaka.
• 116 iPhone 5s were stolen from a Softbank store in Western Osaka (4:24am).
• 42 iPhones were stolen from a nearby Au store (2:30am).

Total value? 7.45 million yen, or about $95,000 worth of iPhones. The reports state that it isn’t certain that these robberies are connected, but I expect they almost certainly are.

Aside from that hiccup, it looks like the iPhone 5 has been warmly received in Japan, with about 750 people queuing this morning at the Ginza Apple store in Tokyo.

Softbank in Roppongi, Tokyo A few days ago new numbers from the Telecommunications Carriers Association in Japan showed that Softbank (TSE:9984) had picked up the most subscribers in July, with 221,700 new sign-ups. Japan’s largest carrier, NTT Docomo (NYSE:DCM), was second with an increase of 151,100, followed by KDDI/au (TYO:9433) with 48,500 (reportedly its lowest total in three years). In addition to snagging the biggest subscriber gain in July, Softbank today has another reason to celebrate. According to its CEO, Masayoshi Son, on August 11 the carrier passed the milestone of 30,000,000 subscribers (thanks to @wireless_watch for the tip). And while that’s still far behind Docomo, who passed 60 million subscribers on March 11; and au who passed 35 million subscribers in the same month (see chart below). Looking at the monthly gains over the past year or so, Softbank has been doing pretty well in its efforts to catch up with Docomo and au, consistently topping them in subscribers gained. Docomo had an especially big swing that came as a result of about 100,000 Playstation Vita prepaid subscribers whose six month contracts expired in June (see spike in December, dip for June).

Japanese Carriers, Monthly Subscriber Gains (TCA, July 2012)

[Download image version of this chart]

Japanese Carriers, Subscriber Totals (TCA, July 2012)

[Download image version of this chart]

Japanese mobile carrier Softbank (TSE:9984) announced today that its new Pantone 5 smartphone, to be released in July, will be the first smartphone with the capability to measure radiation built in.

The company’s CEO Masayoshi Son explained that in the wake of last year’s earthquake and subsequent nuclear emergency, many of his Twitter followers frequently sent him requests for geiger counters to be built into mobile handsets. After the Fukushima nuclear disaster, many people were concerned about environmental radiation levels, often buying expensive geiger counters so they could measure radiation themselves.

This was especially true for mothers with young children, Son added. The user only needs to press on a dedicated button in the lower corner, and the phone will display your current position and the current level of radiation.

The Pantone 5 (or the 107SH, made by Sharp) comes in an array of eight bright colors, and Son pointed out it’s an especially fitting phone for women. The simple Pantone series has been selling very well in Japan, according to Son, with 3.4 million units sold. And now, it’s available as a smartphone, and the company has high hopes that it will sell well. Besides the radioactivity function, the Pantone 5 also is waterproof and dustproof, features 1-seg TV and e-wallet functions, and is powered by Android 4.0.

Some of our readers may recall that Softbank’s competitor Docomo had displayed a radiation measurement jacket for smartphones back at last year’s CEATEC event.

For readers who would like to check out Softbank’s press conference in full, it’s available for viewing on the company’s website.

[h/t to Wireless Watch Japan on Twitter]

SoftBank, Matsumoto argued, is a unique company in the mobile operations market because it comes from an internet services background, rather than from telecom. “Mobile internet is everything,’ Matsumoto said, and it sounded like he meant it.

Bensaid asked how applications were changing were changing the core business of mobile operations, and Matsumoto intimating that for SoftBank, it’s always about what best serves the user. In the case of Apple, for example, telecom operators make nothing whatsoever from app sales; however, SoftBank sells Apple phones because that’s what’s best for the user, Matsumoto claimed. (I suspect there’s also quite a lot of money to be made in selling the handsets anyway, though. It’s not like SoftBank is selling iPhones at a loss purely out for the sake of its users.)

With regards to Android, Bensaid pointed out that many users have complained about Google’s Android Market (now called the “Play Store” for some reason). Is SoftBank interested in developing its own Android app store? Matsumoto said the company was indeed working on a global solution with other companies, including China Telecom. But he also said that SoftBank has a good relationship with Google and it hasn’t had many complaints from users, so SoftBank is less motivated to create its own app store than other companies. “We are not so keen as other operators throughout the world,” Matsumoto said, “but we don’t preclude the possibility.”

A bigger issue for SoftBank has been the mismatch between Android apps and devices, given the fact that some apps won’t work on some devices. Matsumoto says he sees this problem decreasing over time, and said it’s one reason SoftBank has been a little slow in pushing Android devices.

Bensaid asked about 4G, and Matsumoto said it was something the company was pushing quite heavily. Specifically, SoftBank was the first company to launch a TD-LTE 4G network (the technology was developed by China Mobile, but it hasn’t been permitted to actually implement it in China yet). Matsumoto likes 4G so much because, as he describes it, it is faster and more efficient, allowing us to enjoy higher speeds at lower costs. Of course, he also said that SoftBank’s 4G subscription costs about 10 percent more than its 3G subscription, but it also has a much higher data cap: 7 GB for 4G vs. 1.2 GB for 3G.

Matsumoto also said SoftBank has been pushing customers to use wifi whenever it’s available, and has established hundreds of thousands of hotspots to release some of the pressure on its 3G network. Access to these hotspots is free; Matsumoto said it’s worth it to offer users this free service because it takes pressure off of the 3G and 4G mobile networks. “Without wifi,” Matsumoto said, “we could not survive.”

Then Bensaid popped the dreaded question: will SoftBank follow US telecom operators in charging overage fees for people who exceed their monthly data usage caps? Matsumoto said yes, and while he didn’t say what those charges would be, he gave the impression they’re pretty exorbitant, and suggested it’s something users will definitely want to avoid. But he added that SoftBank isn’t out to impoverish its customers: “We will give them all kinds of caution and guide them not to use more than 7 GB,” Matsumoto said.

This post is a part of our coverage of GMIC 2012.

Japanese mobile carrier Softbank (TYO:9984) has just announced that it will form a joint venture with online payments solution PayPal. The joint venture, ‘PayPal Japan,’ is aiming to “revolutionize digital payments in Japan.” The two companies will both invest 1 billion yen each ($12.5 million), and Hiroaki Kitano [1] will serve as the CEO of the joint venture.

As reported a few weeks back, PayPal Here implements a card reader that can be attached to smartphones via the audio jack. And this will be coming to Japan as well, making this the fifth country to receive this payment solution [2]. The card reader add-on itself will retail for 1200 yen, or about $15. David Marcus, the president of Paypal, noted in the announcement:

We are very excited to support the growth of small businesses and empower anyone to be an entrepreneur with the launch of PayPal Here in Japan, one of the most advanced mobile markets in the world yet one where cash is still used for many transactions. […] By partnering with a fast-growing mobile Internet leader like Softbank, we can bring our innovative, secure online and mobile payment solutions to market faster and at greater scale across Japan.

Marcus also noted that they are working on support for JCB cards as well, but don’t have any expected date just yet.

During the press conference, Softbank’s Masayoshi Son explained that he visited eBay (NASQAQ:EBAY) two months ago, and they discussed the possibility of a partnership. At that time PayPal shared its plans for PayPal Here, which had not yet launched at that time. Son pointed out that Softbank and eBay have been competitors in the past in both Japan and China, and grew to respect them as a competitor.

Son says that with many other competing mobile payments that there are often a number of problems, like repeatedly having to top up, or complications when you change to a new handset. Most of these are used for smaller payments, whereas he says that PayPal can be used for payments large and small. He hopes that in five or ten years from now, we Japanese consumers won’t have to carry a wallet anymore.

Softbank currently has 29 million mobile subscribers in Japan.

For anyone interested in the Japanese mobile market, the figures from the Telecommunications Carriers Association website are a great resource. Interestingly, the monthly mobile subscriber figures go all the way back to 1996. That’s more than 15 years of data!

I thought it would be interesting to collect the figures from each carrier, and present it all together as an animation over time, spanning 1996 to 2012. In the chart below you can see that NTT Docomo has been the dominant carrier throughout, with challengers au and Softbank rising to prominence over the past six years or so [1].

You can begin the animation below by pressing ‘play’ on the left. All data is from TCA with subscribers measured in the thousands. If you’d like to re-use what I’ve collected, it’s available here.

Softbank in Roppongi, Tokyo

Softbank Mobile Corp. announced on its website today that it has been approved by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications to proceed with its proposed base station plan for the 900MHz band of wireless spectrum.

This band became available thanks to Japan’s switch to digital TV last year, as it was previously in use by the analog system. What’s interesting though is that the band wasn’t auctioned off by the Ministry, but rather awarded to Softbank after its proposal was submitted last month. The company elaborated on its plan:

The purpose of this application was to cope with the dramatic increase of traffic, enhance coverage, and build a robust disaster-proof communication network… The approved base station plan incorporates the installation of approximately 16,000 base stations in fiscal 2012, to be expanded up to 41,000 by fiscal 2016, providing 99.9 percent population coverage.

The services using the 900MHz band are on course to launch on July 25 of this year. Among the compatible devices for these services are Apple’s iPhone and iPad, as well as Softbank’s (TSE:9984) coming summer lineup of handsets.

It’s certainly good news for Softbank and its customers, because in addition to the afore-mentioned necessity of disaster preparedness, there is also the problem of dramatically increased data consumption. Both Docomo and KDDI have experienced outages in recent months, the former citing data hungry VoIP applications as one possible cause. With regards to disaster preparedness, Docomo announced a list of measures it would be taking, in the wake of lessons learned from last year’s earthquake in March.

According to a Kyodo news report earlier this week, Japanese carrier KDDI (TYO:9433) experienced a data communication disruption that affected over six million users. Our readers may recall that it was just a few weeks back when NTT Docomo experienced a similar service disruption, which it subsequently attributed to increased smartphone usage — particularly the increased use of VoIP applications like Naver Japan’s very popular Line.

What I thought was curious about the KDDI was that the company also acknowledged heavier data traffic from smartphones as a possible cause. From Kyodo’s report:

The latest trouble was caused by a failed electric supply to [KDDI’s] computer servers for e-mail services, but the incident had no impact on voice calls and Internet access, it said, adding that the failure may have resulted from an increase in data communication traffic for smartphones.

While it’s not surprising that carriers are having difficulties accommodating the increased data usage that comes with the rise of smartphones, I was curious to know to what extent Naver Japan’s Line app (with 15 million downloads in seven months) was creating difficulties for KDDI. I sent inquiries to representatives at both KDDI and Naver Japan on Monday, but as yet have not received a reply.

When we attended the Global Mobile Internet Conference last year, Softbank Mobile Corp’s executive vice president Ted Matsumoto commented on increased data usage in Japan:

46 percent is voice and SMS, the rest is data. Data usage is increasing steadily as voice is declining, becoming less and less important. Someday it will be replaced by VOIP.

The big value for us is that smartphones create traffic. We are the people who are in front of the end users to integrate and support the entire value chain. Network operation is only a part of our business. The important thing is that we are in front of end users responsible for end user satisfaction.

So while increased data usage is certainly a welcome thing for providers, this last point on end user satisfaction is key. Can carriers in Japan stay ahead of customer demand without experiencing the outages we have seen in recent weeks? Will new, data-hungry apps like Line be allowed to grow without interference from carriers? And perhaps most importantly, how will carriers’ networks respond in times of crisis like last year’s earthquake? All three major mobile operators (Docomo, KDDI, and Softbank) experienced major outages during the March 11 earthquake last year.

Docomo's most recent mobile lineup had a number of handsets targeting females

Japan’s Telecommunications Carriers Association updated its monthly mobile subscriber data this week, with NTT Docomo making the biggest gains among the ‘big three’ mobile carriers. According to a report by Mainichi Shinbun, this marks the first time in 21 months that Docomo (NYSE:DCM), Japan’s leading carrier in terms of subscribers, had the largest net gain. The report attributes part of Docomo’s gain to the launch of the PlayStation Vita which has Docomo as its official 3G provider.

After the iPhone 4S arrived on both Softbank’s (TYO:9984) and KDDI’s au (TYO:9433) networks, the carrier wars were suddenly interesting, with market leader Docomo having to compete with its lineup of Android phones. But Docomo still sits pretty comfortably ahead occupying almost half of the market at 47.5 percent (see charts below) [1].

Docomo maintains that it can continue to do well without an iPhone in its lineup, and that’s good, because despite the rumors it doesn’t look like it have one anytime soon.

After originally partnering with News Corp to launch Myspace Japan back in 2006, Softbank is now giving up on that joint venture says Reuters, quoting a Nikkei report.

While Myspace was once one of the world’s first and most popular social networking websites, it has since fallen behind newcomers like Facebook to become the butt of more than a few internet jokes about its failure.

It was sold to a group that included Justin Timberlake for $35 million back in June. Now with the closing of its Japan office, Myspace in the US will take over the operations of its Japanese site effective February 1, 2012.

Personally I’ve not used the Myspace Japan site, and in fact, I’ve only ever found myself on Myspace’s English site once or twice. But I’m curious to know how effective its mobile strategy was in Japan (apparently they did have one [1]), and whether that may have played a role in its performance to date. According to Google, traffic to Myspace in Japan has been dropping pretty steadily as you can see below.

[Graph: Google Ad Planner]

Softbank in Roppongi, Tokyo

California-based file-storage/backup service SugarSync has announced that Japanese mobile carrier Softbank (TYO:9433) will be preloading its service on two new Android phones in order to sync users’ photos to their computers.

Both the Panasonic Lumix phone 101P (which might just be more camera than phone) and the Sharp Aquos 102SH will feature the SugarSync app that will automatically back-up your photos to the cloud, without the need to connect to your PC. SugarSync CEO Laura Yecies explained:

As the cameras on smartphones become more advanced, and as more of us use our smartphones as our primary point-and-shoot cameras, most people need a simple solution for getting photos off of their phone and back to their computers.

SugarSync’s announcement describes this current arrangement as an ‘expansion of [its] existing distribution deal’ with Softbank BBSS.

Of course for iPhone users, SugarSync is available for iOS as well, or you can use Apple’s own iCloud to sync your photos. Dropbox fans out there might give DropPhox or SmartPhox a try, which — coming full circle — were developed by DaVinciWare in Japan.

Actress Maki Horikita and actor Ken Watabe at Docomo phone event

Today Docomo (NYSE:DCM) announced the formation of a consortium with other Japanese carriers Softbank (TYO:9433) and KDDI (TYO:9984), in an effort to ‘coordinate the adoption’ of international standards for mobile NFC technology [1].

We’ve been hearing a lot about NFC adoption around the world, particularly this past year. When Google unveiled Google Wallet, it claimed that by 2014, 150 million phones would have NFC. But in order for the technology to serve consumers properly, particularly across borders, there needs to be agreed-upon standards.

Hopefully this new consortium (which will bear the very catchy name of ‘Japan Mobile NFC Consortium’) is a positive step towards better services being offered in Japan.

Of course, Japan has pioneered mobile payments via NFC/FeliCa technology in the past, with systems like Osaifu-Keitai already in use by mobile operators for things like payments on public transit or purchases in stores. Docomo itself has sold 36.6 million handsets with NFC functionality in the first half of the 2011 fiscal year.

Actress Maki Horikita, Docomo CEO Ryuji Yamada, Actor Ken Watanabe

Back in October when I dropped in on Docomo’s Winter phone lineup event, one of the most interesting statements made by its CEO Ryuji Yamada was that he felt Docomo can “fully compete” with the Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhone 4S. Looking at his comments today in discussion with The Wall Street Journal, we get a somewhat clearer picture on why the iPhone remains a competing phone rather than a partner.

While the report quotes him as saying that Docomo has not given up hope of offering the iPhone, but expressed reservations about volume:

If the introduction of the iPhone results in the mass majority of our products occupied by the iPhone, then that’s a scenario that’s difficult to us to swallow.

Another sticking point appears to be Docomo’s in-house applications like its e-wallet and i-mode mail service, which Yamada says are important for Japanese customers — though Apple prefers and insists upon a cleaner experience.

Speaking as a Docomo subscriber, I’d like to see an iPhone come to the network one of these days. But given the recent growth of Android smartphones, I think that as long as the company has a good selection of alternatives (see Samsung Galaxy S II LTE, and the upcoming Galaxy Nexus) then it should be in good shape.

But having said that, if the iPhone were offered on Docomo’s network, I can’t really imagine myself going near any of those Android offerings. But that’s just me…

The agreement brings $10 million in fresh funding for Ustream, bringing its total funding amount to $98.7 million. Founder John Ham said in a statement:

The expansion of Ustream’s presence in Korea through our partnership with SOFTBANK and KT, highlights the growing impact of live and interactive video. . . We are extremely excited to continue building Ustream’s success and reputation as the leader in live and interactive video across the world.

In Korea, Ustream is frequently used to broadcast big-money gaming events or tournaments, where players compete in games such as World of Warcraft or Starcraft.

Since receiving investment from Softbank early last year, Ustream seems to be doing well in Japan. Personally, I see a lot of companies taking advantage of the service, ranging from tech companies live-streaming their events to individual end users taking advantage of its broadcasting power.

[Ustream via Techcrunch]

Softbank in Roppongi, Tokyo

When Apple’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) iPhone 4S went on sale, Japanese consumers were eager to queue up as much fans elsewhere around the world. With the iPhone now running on KDDI au (TYO:9433) as well as Softbank (TYO:9984), we were curious to see how the new iPhone would affect the carrier wars in Japan.

Well, new sales numbers from BCN Ranking in Japan (h/t Akky at Asiajin) show that – at least from retail stores (i.e. not including Apple and carrier stores) – the competition between Au and Softbank is intense.

For the week of October 10 to 16, Softbank holds just a slight edge with 51.8 percent of iPhone 4S sales versus 48.4 for au. You can see the breakdown in the chart below. Of course, Softbank is still selling the iPhone 4, and if that’s included, then Softbank still holds an edge.

BCN: Oct 10-16 retail sales

Meanwhile, the country’s leading carrier NTT Docomo just rolled out its own line of smartphones last week, as we reported here. The new lineup included four new LTE phones, including the Samsung Galaxy SII. The company is also scheduled to roll out the new Android 4.0 Samsung Galaxy Nexus in November, which should be its strongest smartphone competitor for the iPhone 4S running on Softbank and au.

As we mentioned last week, Docomo’s CEO at least sounds confident that his new lineup of phones can “fully compete” with the iPhone. It will be interesting to see how this all plays out in the new year. The current overall breakdown of top handset sales according to BCN is below.

Bharti Enterprises, one of India’s leading business conglomerates, and SoftBank (TYO:9984), Japan’s leading Internet company have just announced a 50:50 controlled joint venture called “Bharti Softbank Holdings Pte. Ltd” which will focus on the mobile Internet space in India.

According to the announcement, this joint venture will primarily focus on three key areas of India’s mobile Internet ecosystem - social media, gaming and e-commerce. It will also aid the growth of various services in this ecosystem, which already boasts of 858 million mobile subscribers as of July 2011, according to the latest stats from Telecom Regulatory Authority of India.

Expressing delight at this partnership, Mr. Kavin Bharti Mittal, Bharti SoftBank’s head of strategy and new product development said:

India, which has emerged as the second largest mobile market in the world, stands at the cusp of another revolution – mobile internet.

With a fast growing economy, a large youth population and access to cheaper and faster data, there is a unique opportunity to build services ground up for mobile, especially in a country where the first screen for most is a mobile device. We are delighted to partner with SoftBank, whose vast experience in this area will help us build and invest in services for India.

Atsushi Taira, the CEO at Bharti SoftBank Holdings Pte. Ltd who was previously an SVP, strategic business development at Softbank Corp said:

Over the decades, SoftBank has endeavoured to develop new markets for Internet businesses, starting from the U.S., China and now India.

I believe that through the mobile internet, we can change people’s lives in India and empower each one of them to contribute to society’s exponential growth. I am very excited to be a part of this vision and delighted to have Bharti, with its unparalleled vision, knowledge and experience with emerging markets, as our partner. This partnership represents a significant step in SoftBank’s journey towards becoming No.1 in the mobile internet industry.

[Image Credit: p22311919 on Flickr]

Surely Softbank will feel the pinch as Apple fans now have more options in getting an iPhone. This reminded me of a similar situation here in Singapore a couple of years ago where SingTel was the only exclusive carrier that offered the iPhone.

And back then I was a Starhub user which forced me to pay premium to terminate my previous plan and jump ship to SingTel (sorry Starhub). Did I have any choice back then? Not really. But I’m glad that now Starhub and M1 also offer the iPhone now. To consumers, it’s a big, big relief. So I can imagine how KDDI’s subscribers are feeling now – it’s pretty awesome.

Chinese telecommunications companies Huawei and ZTE will help Softbank build it’s new 4G network. Softbank announced the new 110 Mbps network at an event yesterday, saying that it would launch in November.

The network will based on the AXGP format, which is compatible with the Chinese LTE TDD standard that Apple will reportedly support.

The announcement of the joint contract revealed what might be an underlying drama between Chinese rivals Huawei and ZTE. The latter had an interesting choice of words regarding the announcment, saying that it is the “primary strategic partner” for Softbank in building the new network, this according to a Bloomberg report.

Huawei had no such comment about the extent of its partnership, but its press release made no mention of ZTE. To be fair, there’s nothing that says it has to) — I just thought it was an interesting omission. When contacted Huawei by Penn Olson this evening, Huawei could not disclose the size of the contract, and not surprisingly, it declined to comment on its competitor’s comment.

It’s not insignificant that earlier this year Huawei sued ZTE alleging patent infringement relating to its LTE technology.

On a related note, both of these Shenzhen-based companies are expected to lead the smartphone industry in growth this year. For Huawei in particular, this venture in Japan is another example of how the company is stepping up its business operations overseas in comparison to at home (see right).

[Photo: mycom.co.jp, ascii.jp, Chart data from Huawei.com, PDF]

Thanks to a late night tweet from Serkan Toto for pointing out a Nikkei report claiming the iPhone 5 will be sold by KDDI later this year. If the report proves true, KDDI would be the second carrier to carry Apple’s coveted iPhone in Japan after Softbank, which has enjoyed an exclusive deal since 2008.

While the most recent rumors put the U.S. arrival of the iPhone 5 at October 4, the Nikkei report – quoting ‘officials ’ – says that the handset would start selling in KDDI/au shops in November early 2012.

As with AT&T’s early monopoly on Apple’s iPhone in the U.S. before it finally jumped to Verizon this year, many users in Japan will be happy to switch over to KDDI/au once there’s another carrier option. The nation’s biggest carrier, of course, is still NTT Docomo.

Softbank has been gaining on second place au thanks to strong sales of the iPhone 4 (see below). It will be interesting to see how the iPhone 5 affects the mobile wars in Japan.

From Nikkei Business (English annotations ours)

InMobi has offices in London, San Francisco, Bangalore, Tokyo, Nairobi, and Singapore
, serving over 165 countries and 340 million consumers, generating a whopping 47 billion mobile ad impressions per month.

The mobile ad network has attracted a lot of attention in recent months. First with its helpful market research report on the mobile industry, and second with its recent acquisition of U.S-based Sprout for its HTML5 rich-media mobile ads platform. With $200 million in the bank, we can very well expect InMobi to go through an aggressive expansion plan. But exactly how is something we all are interested to find out. Stay tuned.

Check out the full press release we received, below:

SINGAPORE, SAN MATEO – 15 September, 2011 – InMobi, the world’s largest independent mobile ad network, and SOFTBANK Corp, completed a $200 million investment, early this week. The funding will take place in two tranches- $100 million in September 2011 followed by an equivalent tranche in April 2012.

Softbank joins existing investors Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sherpalo Ventures in helping InMobi become a global leader in the mobile advertising industry. The $200 million investment, one of the largest to date in the mobile internet space , will help the company create value across the mobile ecosystem globally through world-class advertising, mobile payments using SmartPay™, and HTML5 rich media production and distribution using the recently acquired Sprout™ platform.

Naveen Tewari, Founder & CEO of InMobi, commented: “The size of the investment and quality of investor validate the enormous potential in mobile today and strengthen our role in helping the industry evolve. We have already established ourselves as a leader in mobile advertising on every continent. This is just the beginning. With a global leader like Softbank behind us, we are now well positioned to fully capitalize on the opportunity before us through substantially increased product innovation, deeper market penetration, and acquisitions across the mobile ad value chain.”

“I am delighted at this opportunity to partner with InMobi, one the world’s largest mobile ad networks”, said Masayoshi Son, Chairman and CEO of Softbank. “I hope the partnership with InMobi, a fast-growing startup with significant mobile expertise and an outstanding technology platform; will further accelerate the pace of development in the mobile Internet space globally. We believe this partnership will help Softbank become the No. 1 Internet company in Asia and I look forward to working with the InMobi team.”

This partnership will provide Softbank and InMobi with opportunities to further explore global scale collaboration in the fast growing mobile ad market. It is also expected to generate further synergies between InMobi and Softbank, given the significant number of prominent Asian Internet companies in Softbank’s investment portfolio.

John Doerr, Managing Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, said: “InMobi is a rapidly growing company in one of the most explosive technology sectors. InMobi delivers extraordinary value to publishers and advertisers globally. They are a leader in the mobile advertising revolution.”

Ram Shriram, Founder of Sherpalo Ventures added: “InMobi joins a select set of companies globally that have achieved massive scale in a short period of time. This investment is a strong validation of the mobile opportunity across the globe and InMobi’s ability to exploit to its full potential. Mobile and Smart Phones are changing the world for consumers, businesses, advertisers and publishers.”

Softbank will still hold a 0.002 percent stake in Yahoo, not to be confused with Yahoo Japan which is jointly owned by the two companies (Softbank at 42 percent, Yahoo at 35 percent).

According to a Reuters report, analyst Yoshisugu Sasaki explained today’s announcement saying “This just looks like Softbank’s attempt to improve its finances.” The company says its net profit for the fiscal year is likely to be boosted 44.7 billion yen (or about $581 million).

Softbank and Yahoo also shared headlines over the course of this year as players in the very messy Alibaba/Alipay controversy, which was only just settled last month.

earthquake early warning on iOS5 (lower setting)

9to5 Mac is reporting today that Apple will bring an early earthquake warning to the upcoming iOS 5. EEW is a common feature on phones in Japan, although to my knowledge most handsets from overseas manufacturers haven’t supported it.

It’s a welcome addition for Softbank, the iPhone’s carrier in Japan, as it has been slower to adopt early warning on its phones than competing carriers. As of March of this year, only its 831N supported the system.

When we questioned Softbank Mobile Corp about this back at the Global Mobile Internet Conference in Beijing, executive vice president Ted Mastumoto reiterated Softbank’s previous commitment to improve on this point.

While there have been third-party apps to provide users with warnings in the past, it’s great to see that Apple has jumped behind this in iOS 5. I’ve heard some people assert that a few seconds of warning don’t matter in the event of an earthquake. But even if it helps just a handful of people, then it’s a worthwhile undertaking.

[Photo: @yabeaki]

Photo: itmedia.co.jp

Here’s something I never really expected to see. Courtesy of the folks over at Softbank, and with some hardware help from Sharp, comes a Yahoo Phone. Set for release in Japan in late September, the Android-powered Softbank 009SH Y is the Yahoo doppleganger of the Aquos Phone 009SH.

Only it has a ‘Y.’

You were probably wondering why yourself, right? Why a Yahoo Phone?

Well despite the fact that Yahoo has seen better days in most regions, the service is still the dominant search engine in Japan, as we pointed out last month in our post on Baidu Japan’s continuing troubles. The most recent numbers we’ve seen showed it holding 56.2 percent market share, although of course it is powered by Google these days.

As for mobile, Softbank says that the home page for the smartphone edition of Yahoo Japan has seen six times the page views this June when compared to the same period a year ago. And of course, it’s expected to see even more traffic with initiatives such as this one.

For me, part of the lure of Android phones (were I to get one) is the fact that I’m a heavy user of many Google services, and the close integration is a big selling point. Similarly I’d imagine that for many casual internet/mobile users in Japan, the recognizable Yahoo brand would be seen as a trustworthy, with the Yahoo services offered being a similar draw.

Nonetheless, if I were one of the folks at Mountain View, I’d find it difficult not to snicker thinking that in Japan both the Yahoo Phone and Yahoo search are now powered by Google.

[Softbank via Techcrunch]

Finally. We just received word from Alibaba that the long-standing dispute over Alipay, its online payment system, between Yahoo, Alibaba, and Softbank has finally settled.

Alibaba’s head Jack Ma had spoken at AllThingD conference two months ago where he briefly discussed the Alipay issue. Nonetheless rumors arose on a number of occasions that the issue between Yahoo and Alibaba had been resolved, but requiring the approval of Softbank, no agreement came about until now.

The agreement breaks down as follows, as per Alibaba’s announcement:

The agreement preserves the existing relationship between Taobao and Alipay. Alipay will continue to provide payment processing services to Alibaba Group and its subsidiaries (including Taobao) on preferential terms.

Alibaba Group will license to Alipay certain intellectual property and technology and provide certain software technology services to Alipay and its subsidiaries. Alipay will pay to Alibaba Group, prior to a liquidity event, a royalty and software technology services fee, which consists of an expense reimbursement and a 49.9% share of the consolidated pre-tax income of Alipay and its subsidiaries.

Alibaba Group will receive no less than $2 billion and no more than $6 billion in proceeds from an IPO of Alipay or other liquidity event. The exact proceeds to Alibaba Group will be determined by multiplying the total equity value of Alipay by 37.5 percent, subject to the foregoing floor and ceiling amounts.

The agreement states that “Alibaba Group will continue to participate in Alipay’s future financial performance” which could mean anywhere from two to six billion dollars for the company if there is a future IPO or ‘liquidity event.’

Yahoo hosted a conference call with both Alibaba Group and Softbank at 8:45am EST today (just starting as we publish this). Neither Jack Ma, Carol Bartz, nor Masayoshi Son were present on the call, but for those who want to listen the live webcast can be viewed via Yahoo’s Investor Relations website. Instructions on how to hear an audio replay can be found here.

Despite being embroiled in the controversy, Alibaba has managed to keep busy of late. Last month we reported that Jack Ma had decided to divide Taobao up into three subsidiaries, Taobao Marketplace, Taobao Mall, and eTao. And just this month the company brought mobile bar code payments to its Alipay apps, a feature that will likely come in handy in its new mobile operating system Aliyun which was confirmed just yesterday.

[With contributions from Willis Wee, Steven Millward]

Sharma: India to pass China in mobile subscribers in Q2 2012

Analyst Chetan Sharma has released his State of the Global Mobile Industry report, with a number of key insights regarding growth in India and China.

While China does have the biggest number of mobile subscribers, the US is still superior in revenue. In terms of ARPU (average revenue per user) Japan tops all nations, according to the report, driven by NTT Docomo, KDDI, and Softbank Japan, the top three global operators in mobile data ARPU.

We reported a few days ago about India’s growing mobile subscriber base, and how despite it’s recent momentum it still trails behind China. Sharma actually projects that India will pass China before Q2 2012 (see chart above), saying that the nation is adding mobile subscriptions at a faster rate as they both approach the one billion mark. But for India this does not necessarily mean that revenues will skyrocket as well, says Sharma:

While India has the highest subscriber growth rate in the world right now, the revenue generating opportunity remains down right anemic compared to other major markets with average dropping down to $3.50 in overall ARPU. Even with a significant subscriber base, there is going to be a general lack of opportunity in the market for the next couple of years relative to other markets.

Do check out the full report, as it’s jam-packed with a ton of information — not just on India and China, but on the mobile world as a whole. It’s available below via slideshare (best viewed in full-screen view using the button in the lower right), or you can visit Sharma’s blog and get it in pdf format.

State of the Global Mobile Industry

[UPDATE: July 8th, AM - We've been contacted by Alibaba Group representatives who claim that there are "factual errors and bad underlying info" in the source, the China Entrepreneurs Magazine (CEM) interview. On the understanding that CEM will amend and correct its post shortly, we're amending some aspects of the first-person quotes attributed to Jack Ma.]

[UPDATE 2: July 8th, AM - Also, we've be contacted by CEM's English Editor who admits grave errors in their transcript, saying, "We found some mistakes that may cause people's misunderstanding." CEM's official notice and apology is here. So, we've removed the PDF transcript that had been embedded at the bottom of the post, and also deleted the offending passages from CEM's inaccurate initial transcript. A corrected transcript will be issued shortly. Apologies to our readers for running with the source's inaccurate text.]

Jack Ma, the Alibaba founder and CEO, has finally spoken up and revealed the thought-processes behind his controversial and cavalier transference of Alipay away from the Alibaba Group – a move that left Yahoo (which owns 39% of the Group) embarrassed, and exposed just how in the dark the American firm is about Alibaba’s inner workings.

In a tough-talking, exclusive interview today with the Chinese-language China Entrepreneur Magazine, Ma admits to unilaterally shifting its online payment platform Alipay away from the Group, with full consent from neither the board of directors nor Softbank or Yahoo.

Mr. Ma paints it as a necessary move – and, importantly, a fully legal ploy – for Alipay to get a crucial government-mandated online payments license, where the Group’s majority foreign ownership (Japan’s Softbank owns 29.3% too) would have been an issue at state-level.

Jack Ma vigorously defends himself and emphasizes what a difficult, time-sensitive position he was in, saying:

I’m standing here with the Central Bank of China on one side, and they’ve [Softbank and Yahoo] squeezed me out and made me out to be the bad guy ….. I’ll tell you, this matter wouldn’t have even been approved with ten times the time. Why? Sun [Zhengi; of Softbank] has countless investments. If Alibaba were to die, sure, he’d be sore, but to him it’s one of many. To us, it’s everything. Yahoo is in a similar situation.

As part of his bold move, Ma terminated the “variable interest entity” (VIE) that usually safeguards the assets of foreign owners in a firm, as he realised at the start of the year that he was in this bind – facing three options to move forward, or risk seeing Alipay being shut down by authorities for the lack of proper paperwork. The interview makes clear that Ma favored termination of VIE and organizing compensation later; Softbank’s Sun Zhengyi preferred to maintain the VIE but lie about its existence to the State Council (which is technically illegal); while the third option was to keep VIE and go through due process, with a heightened risk of Alipay failing to get its license. In Jack Ma’s own words, Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang “was sitting on the fence”. And so Ma unilaterally made his move.

“I don’t like politics, I don’t play at it”

Jack Ma’s actions this year have made him into something of a hate figure in tech circles in China, with some accusing him of worsening an awful June for Chinese tech IPOs by heightening uncertainty and making Chinese tech firms look risky. As for Yahoo, they’re now facing a class-action lawsuit by some shareholders accusing Yahoo of not being sufficiently in control – and those claims might be strengthened by Ma’s words in this interview.

Yahoo’s Jerry Yang comes out badly from this, for sitting on the fence for so long over the license process issue. Jack Ma also believes that Yang made the wrong move in how he handled the news, adding, “he should have immediately told the Yahoo shareholders, but he waited until May to tell them.”

[Source: China Entrepreneur Magazine]

Baidu Japan actually opened in 2007, but required a relaunch in ’08 after a shaky start. Those accumulated losses seem to have been sunk into general running and admin costs.

The Japanese search engine market is dominated by Yahoo, although Yahoo search is now powered by Google in Japan. This graphic, from SearchEngineWatch.com, reveals that Yahoo Japan holds 56.2% of the marketshare in the country, with Google.co.jp on second with 31.3%. Baidu Japan squeezes into the small purple slice that’s badged ‘others’:

Image source: SearchEngineWatch.com - Showing search engine market share in Japan in mid-2010

Baidu’s filings, made at the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), reveal that Baidu is only generating profit in its homeland. That’s in contrast to Google, which makes almost half of its profits – across search, advertising, and numerous other products – overseas.

Japan is the world’s third-biggest search market, behind the US and China. When Baidu.jp opened up in 2007, Baidu’s CEO Robin Li remarked:

We believe that with our proven strength in Chinese language search and our focus on delivering the best user experience, we will be able to provide Japanese users with a quality alternative to existing search engines.

But it has proved tougher than expected. Baidu Japan’s losses aren’t narrowing, and in fact have slowly inflated over the last three years, to 2010′s annual losses of RMB 260 million.

[Source of stats: Sina Tech news - article in Chinese]

Three parts! (photo from manageria.gazeta.pl)

After suggesting at the recent All Things D conference that Yahoo might solve some of its problems by splitting into smaller pieces, Jack Ma has applied this same strategy to his own company. We received a note from Alibaba today alerting us of the move, one that will see e-commerce giant Taobao form three separate companies.

The (Three) Tao of Jack

We’re told that as of today, these three Alibaba subsidiaries will begin operations as follows:

• Taobao Marketplace – “China’s leading consumer-to-consumer (C2C) platform”
• Taobao Mall – “China’s leading business-to-consumer (B2C) shopping site”
• etao – “a product search engine designed to make it easier for consumers to find goods and services offered by all e-tailers”

On its Alizila news site, an Alibaba official explains the move:

You can’t be all things to all people as one big Taobao.com website. This will allow us to expand consumer traffic because we now have three entry points (for online shopping) instead of one entry point.

While I’m not convinced that it will necessarily expand consumer traffic, it should make things a little easier for managers to focus on these fragmented silos.

Jack Ma explained the move in greater detail in a letter to the company’s employees. Alibaba has kindly provided us with a copy, which we have included below.

Photo: manageria

For starters, the Softbank partnership will mean that Dropbox is to be preloaded on two Android handsets in Japan. Softbank will be providing an additional two gigabytes of storage free, on top of the two gigabytes that Dropbox already provides. The Dropbox model provides paid options for users to upgrade to more storage if they choose.

Softbank was recently ranked 13th on a Wireless Intelligence’s global ranking of mobile operators according to revenue. But at the recent Global Mobile Internet Conference, the company’s EVP Ted Matsumoto stated that Softbank aspires to be the number one mobile internet service provider on the planet.

Dropbox has more than a few fans in Japan already as the service was used by a number of people to share information and host improvised websites in the wake of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

We have reached out to our contact at Softbank this morning for more details about the nature of the Dropbox partnership, but we have yet to receive a reply.

Via Bloomberg

Docomo places 6th in global revenue

Here’s an interesting report from Wireless Intelligence ranking the top 20 global mobile operators according to revenue.

As you might expect, China Mobile is way out front with revenue of almost US$20 million in Q4 2010. Japanese provider NTT Docomo comes in sixth at 11.5 billion, but did so with a fraction of the customer base (57.2 million as opposed to China Mobile’s 584 million). Other Japanese operators, au (KDDI) and Softbank finished at 11 and 13 respectively.

Examining the year-on-year growth percentage from the report tells a far different story however, as Indian provider Bharti Airtel posted a 63.6 percent gain. China Unicom also did well improving 21.5 percent on the previous year, as did Softbank at 14 percent.

For a closer look at the numbers, you can filter according to category below.

Ted Matsumoto, Senior Executive VP, Softbank Mobile Corp

At the Global Mobile Internet Conference last week, we had a chance to sit down with Softbank Mobile Corp’s Senior Executive Vice President.

He told us about the CEO Masayoshi Son’s efforts to setting up an energy advisory committee in the wake of the recent disaster in Japan:

He is [working on that committee] very independently from the business. It has absolutely nothing to do with the business… He is a third generation Korean Japanese, but he really loves Japan. He really wanted to do some significant contribution for Japan as a country… He is anti-nuclear power, and he really thinks new energy, safer energy should be promoted. And he wants to spend his time to develop such activities. Of course this part he can’t do it alone, so he tries to team up with others, involving the government to try to do something.

Mr Matsumoto also touched on Son’s enormous personal contribution to earthquake relief:

It’s interesting that in the management committee, he joked “Hey guys, I may become very poor because I’ve already made a promise to receive no salary. So when that happens, please help me.” He is not going to receive any pay in his lifetime from his company activities… But he’s the kind of guy that if he does something he wants to do it on a big scale.

Mr. Matsumoto also told us that Softbank is very pleased with its relationship with Apple, saying “Mr. Son shares the same philosophy with Steve Jobs,” adding that “the chemistry is very good.” But he also explained that Android holds promise as well, because realistically “100% of our users cannot be iPhone users.”

During his on-stage talk at GMIC Mr. Matsumoto boldly stated that Softbank’s target is to become the number one mobile internet service provider n the world. He said that while Docomo and Au are very strong, he thinks that Softbank is doing pretty well.

Masayoshi Son

Softbank’s president, Masayoshi Son, will be personally contributing the enormous sum of  10 billion yen (about $118 million) to the Japan earthquake and tsunami relief effort. On top of that the 53-year-old Son, who is the richest man in Japan, will donate all his future earnings as the head of Softbank to children who were orphaned as a result of the disaster.

Softbank has already donated one billion yen in relief money to the Japan Red Cross Society and other organizations.

This comes amid news that much of the aid received thus far by the Red Cross has yet to actually reach disaster victims:

The Red Cross has dispatched more than 200 emergency relief teams to the disaster zone and organized thousands of volunteers to assist victims. But no displaced people have received cash handouts from the pot of 870 billion yen collected by the Japanese Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies and the Central Community Chest of Japan.

Softbank, ostensibly already aware of this issue, said in its statement yesterday that it is “seeking methods of donation that can immediately provide relief money and aid to those urgently in need of support.”

Photo: ChinaZ