Market reports: What's hot in Japan?

According to some market reports, the hot topics in Japan are the rise of mobile advertising spending and the high penetration rate of quick response (QR) code technology.

Mobile advertising revenue in Japan will more than triple by 2011, according to the "2006 Advertising Expenditures in Japan" report by leading advertiser Dentsu.

Japan has become a leader in developing QR code technology for inputting product or service information into the phone. An NPD Group report titled "Japan Consumer Wireless Study" found that that barcode readers had eclipsed location-based services and radio applications as the mobile features most commonly used by consumers in Japan.

Source: eMarketer

KDDI reports one million GPS users

Credit: IT Media

KDDI au announced that its paying user base of mobile GPS services had reached one million. KDDI started offering GPS-enabled cellphones in 2003 when it introduced a navigation service oriented on pedestrians. The service was able to pinpoint user’s current location and navigate him to the desired destination point by providing voice and on-screen instructions real time. In 2005, KDDI added another navigation service, targeting car-drivers with the ability to announce crossroads and re-calculate the route. Both services were developed by the company called Navi Time Japan.