The British Phonepoint system and the planned UK Personal Communications Networks technologies could get a boost from an unexpected quarter – and one that may well interest British Rail in its efforts to get into the telecommunications business (CI No 1,251). Telecom Japan, the independent telecommunications affiliate of Japan Railways, is planning to enter the mobile telephone market in the medium term so that it can offer end-to-end communications on its network without having to switch customers via Nippon Telegraph & Telephone lines, and it wants to use a simple digital portable phone system to do this. It is watching closely the British experience with Telepoint, and its ears reportedly pricked up at the news that British Rail was to allow Telepoint base stations to be installed at 2,400 railway stations. Because of the crowding of the frequency spectrum in Japan and the difficulties of getting permission from the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications officials for new initiatives, it is likely that Telecom Japan will wait three or four years to enter the market with a mobile system, by which time digital telecommunications will be more widespread in Japan. Going for a Telepoint or Personal Communications-type system contrasts with the strategy of the other two new independent long-distance telecommunications providers, Dainidenden of the Kyocera group, and Japan High-Speed Communications, the company owned by the consortium of the Japanese highway authority and Toyota Motor Co, which have each chosen to set up analogue cellular systems that are linked to their own long-distance nets.
