Mobile Phones
Mobile Phone Carriers -- Latest November data for Japanese mobile telecos -- new subscribers up 32.9% MoM
On January 7, Japan's Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA) reported data for mobile phone carriers' contacts for new subscribers. New subscribers for the 3 major carriers (DoCoMo, au, and Softbank) plus E-Mobile (a firm offering only data transmission services) amounted to 661,300 units. By carrier, Softbank led for 9th month with 324,900, trailed by DoCoMo with 16,960 new units. Overall carriers toted up a 50.1% year-on-year gain compared with December 2009 and a 32.9% month-on-month gain in new subscribers.
Demand for multi-purpose smartphones has supported demand for new cell phone subscriptions. Fueled by its introduction of a large number of new models, NTT DoCoMo enjoyed 91.8% month-on-month growth.
JMR's aggregation of monthly data from TCA
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Mobile Phone Carriers -- Latest November data for Japanese mobile telecos -- new subscribers up 76% MoM
On December 7, Japan's Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA) reported data for mobile phone carriers' contacts for new subscribers. New subscribers for the 3 major carriers (DoCoMo, au, and Softbank plus E-Mobile, a firm offering only data transmission services.) amounted to 497,600 units. By carrier, Softbank continued to lead for the 8th month with 276,600, trailed by DoCoMo with 8,100 new units. Overall carriers toted up a healthy 76% month-on-month gain in new subscribers.
With its exclusive right from Apple to provide iPhones in Japan, Softbank has pulled in a steady rise of new subscribers. More recently DoCoMo and au have come out with iPhone competitor products based on the Android operating system. Traditional mobile phone demand, i.e., phones not optimized for data transfer and related applications, are declining in Japan due to market saturation. But smartphones providing a wealth of digitial data applications are in strong demand.
Smartphones have become multi-purpose mobile data terminals serving up everything from business news, to games, to shopping comparisons, and more. Meanwhile demand for POTS (plain old voice telephone services) is in decline. In the offing, when demand for ever more data services falters, new mobile phone subscriptions are likely to fall as well. That is unless the wizards at Yahoo, Google, et al. and young digital entrepreneurs can come up with new ways to tempt consumers with new must-have digital applications served up to their mobile devices.
JMR's aggregation of monthly data from TCA
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Previous Updates
Mobile Phone Carriers -- Top 4 Japanese teleco carrier new subscribers and year-on-year changes for July 2010.
On August 6, 2010 Japan's Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA) reported data for mobile phone carriers' contacts for new subscribers.
New subscribers totaled 557,900 in July 2010, including the big players in the Japanese telecommunications market DoCoMo, au, and Softbank plus E-Mobile, a firm offering only data transmission services.
All four telecos combined gained a positive YoY change of 46.1% point in July 2010. Despite having experienced declining subscriptions in March 2010, Softbank is defending its market leader position in terms of new mobile subscriptions for the fourth month in a row.
New mobile subscriptions in Japan 2010-07 (Docomo, Softbank, au by KDDI, and E-Mobile)
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Mobile Phone Carriers -- Top 4 Japanese teleco carrier new subscribers and year-on-year changes for June 2010.
On July 7, 2010 Japan's Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA) reported data for mobile phone carriers' contacts for new subscribers. New subscribers totaled 526,900 in June 2010, including the big players in the Japanese telecommunications market DoCoMo, au, and Softbank plus E-Mobile, a firm offering only data transmission services.
Softbank racked up the most new subscribers in June 2010, reaching some 229,500 subscribers. The next highest subscriber gains were by NTT Docomo with 164,600 new contracts in June.
All four telecos combined gained a positive YoY change of 146.1% in June 2010. Despite having experienced declining subscriptions in March 2010, Softbank is defending its market leader position in terms of new mobile subscriptions for the third month in a row.
New mobile subscriptions in Japan 2010-06 (Docomo, Softbank, au by KDDI, and E-Mobile)
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Mobile Phone Carriers -- Top 4 Japanese teleco carrier new subscribers and year-on-year changes.
On June 7, 2010 Japan's Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA) reported data for mobile phone carriers' contacts for new subscribers. New subscribers totaled 470,000 in may 2010, including the big players in the Japanese telecommunications market DoCoMo, au, and Softbank plus E-Mobile, a firm offering only data transmission services.
Softbank racked up the most new subscribers during in May 2010, reaching some 251,100 subscribers. The next highest subscriber gains were by NTT Docomo with 113,200 new contracts in May.
All four telecos combined gained a positive YoY change of 165.8% in May 2010. Despite having experienced declining subscriptions in March 2010, Softbank is now again leading the market in terms of new mobile subscriptions. Softbank, Apple's designated agent for the iPhone in Japan, is expected to experience further increases in new subscriptions due to the release of the immensely popular iPhone 4 at the end of June 2010.
New mobile subscriptions in Japan 2010-05 (Docomo, Softbank, au by KDDI, and E-Mobile)
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Mobile Phone Carriers -- Top 4 Japanese teleco carrier new subscribers and year-on-year changes.
On April 7, 2010 Japan's Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA) reported data for mobile phone carriers' contacts for new subscribers. New subscribers totaled 667,700 in the first quarter of 2010, including the big players in the Japanese telecommunications market DoCoMo, au, and Softbank plus E-Mobile, a firm offering only data transmission services.
NTT DoCoMo racked up the most new subscribers during the last two months, reaching some 389,000 subscribers in March 2010. The next highest subscriber gains were by au with 305,200 new contracts in March.
A decrease in new subscribers for Softbank services resulted in 66.4% year-on-year decline for the big 4 mobile telecos combined, the poorest business performance since April 2009.
New mobile subscriptions in Japan 2010-04 (Docomo, Softbank, au by KDDI, and E-Mobile)
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