Softbank beats Japanese rivals — MobileMonday Global: Industry News

^{8 month winning streak} Softbank beats Japanese rivals

10 Jan 2008 at 19:05 GMT Timo Poropudas

The runt of the Japanese mobile market, Softbank Corp, managed to add more subscribers during December than either of its larger rivals - NTT DoCoMo and KDDI, according to figures from the country's Telecommunications Carriers Association.

Softbank Mobile seems to excel where it’s failed as Vodafone Japan. The operator’s aggressive marketing campaign helped it to add a net 210,800 customers, compared to KDDI's 138,600 net new additions to its mobile services. The market leader, NTT DoCoMo, could only manage to add a net total of 121,500 subscribers during December.

The figures still leave Softbank Mobile far behind with 17.4 million customers at the end of December, compared to DoCoMo's 53.15 million and KDDI's 29.55 million. Softbank has now added more customers than its rivals every month for eight months in a row, reports consulting company BWCS on its website.

In November 2007 Softbank announced an MVNO deal with Walt Disney Corporation. The plan is that the US entertainment conglomerate will use its stock of well-known characters to try to win a share of the mobile market in Japan.

Providing it is given the necessary permissions from the Japanese Communications Ministry, Mobile Disney should launch in the spring.