JT speeds 3G launch

date: 18 September 2000

Japan Telecom plans to cut long-distance rates and bring forward the launch of its third-generation mobile phone service in an attempt to compete with NTT group companies, which dominate the fixed-line and mobile markets.

Haruo Murakami, president of Japan Telecom, said the operator would offer discounts in fixed-line services from October, at the earliest, in response to a plan by NTT to cut its intra-prefectural long-distance rates.

Mr Murakami also indicated that J-Phone, its wireless operator, aims to introduce third-generation services in the autumn of next year rather than December, as initially planned.

"We have applied for third-generation licences with a view to [starting services] next December, but of course we would like to begin services as soon as possible," Mr Murakami said yesterday. "We do want to catch up with DoCoMo as soon as possible."

Japan Telecom, in which BT and AT&T have a joint 30 per cent stake, is Japan's third largest telecoms group after NTT and KDDI, which is being formed through a merger between KDD, DDI and IDO in October. The growth of J-Phone has buoyed the telecoms group. J-Phone has seen its wireless subscriber numbers rise steadily on the strength of JSkyWeb, a service that provides access to the internet. Among J-Phone's 8.89m subscribers, 2.2m have signed up for J-Phone's internet service.

However, both J-Phone and the new KDDI have struggled to compete effectively with DoCoMo. Compared with DoCoMo's 31.5m subscribers, the combined subscriber base of the new KDDI will be 13.9m, while J-Phone's subscribers totalled 8.89m at the end of July.

Although J-Phone raised Y700bn ($6.6bn) earlier this year in a third-party share allotment to invest in third-generation services, efforts to bring forward the start of 3G services face considerable difficulties, the company said. In addition to the difficulty of finding space for the new base stations, the fact that 3G will be a completely different system from the current system also adds to the difficulty of early implementation, J-Phone said.

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