Palm Computing is looking to make it big in Japan through its alliances with Sony Corp and NTT DoCoMo. The soon-to-be-floated 3Com subsidiary does not have a large share of the Japanese market. Microsoft developed a localized version of CE before Palm had a Japanese OS and domestic manufacturers – such as Casio – went with Microsoft. However, Palm wants to shift that balance of power through its new partnerships and by developing the wireless and e-commerce capabilities of the Palm platform.
Palm and Sony are co-developing a wireless handheld with audio/visual functions that uses the Sony memory stick storage technology, this is expected be launched by the middle of next year. Mark Bercow, vice president of Palm, told Asia BizTech, he expects that online trading will be a ‘killer app’ for the devices, picking out stock trading and music downloads (onto the memory stick) as two growth fields.
NTT DoCoMo and Palm are co-developing a device that will use the mobile operator’s networks. Bercow said that more details would be announced early next year. One of our future themes is to merge voice with data, Bercow said, If a terminal handles both voice calls and data communication, users can make a call and send/receive data with only one unit in their pocket.
However, Japanese CE vendors are not resting on their laurels when it comes to developing multi-function, wireless handhelds. On Wednesday, Casio and Siemens said that they would collaborate on a device that sounds very similar to Sony’s future handhelds, offering wireless and multimedia functions.
