Online drag retailers Kenko.com in Tokyo and Wellnet[J] in Yokohama have sued Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare for seeking to lift the ban on online drag sales, and Tokyo District Court[J] dismissed the suit on Tuesday.   Japan e-Business Association[J], consisting of e-commerce giants such as Rakuten and Yahoo Japan, announced a comment blaming the court for the judgment today.

Mr. Genri Goto, Kenko.com CEO made a press briefing and declared the intention that they would take the appeal to a higher court.

See also:

• Japan is going to ban online non-prescription drug sales
• Kenko.com and Wellnet Sues Japanese Government around Drug e-Commerce Ban
• Japanese Online Drug Retailer Forced To Go Abroad To Serve Japanese Customers

Tags: Japan, News, Society by Masaru IKEDA
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GMO Internet, Japan’s leading provider in ISP, web server hosting, domain registration etc., kicked off a new project in order to boost potential developers to create new social apps last weekend.

GMO Venture Partners (GMO-VP)[J], a GMO’s arm in their investment and incubation business, set up a project called “Apuri Yarouze!” (Let’s create social apps!)[J] and started accepting entries of business plans on their website.   The plans are required to be intended for developing new social apps for Japan’s major social network platforms such as Mixi[J], Mobage-town[J] and GREE[J].   GMO-VP will provide the total amount of approx. USD320 million worth capital to the potential developers whose business plans will have been passed the judgment by the committees consisting of Toshiyuki Inoko (CEO, TeamLab), Ryo Shimizu (CEO, Ubiquitous Entertainment), Mitsuru Sugaya[J] (cartoonist), Tomoyasu Hirano (CEO, Digital Stage[J]) and more.

The project provides around USD30,000 – 300,000 as system integration cost to each of the potential developers in terms of financial assistance.  GMO provides their server infrastructure to the developers for free.   After the app’s release, the developer can take 80% of the profit earned from the app, and the project takes the rest of it.

At the kick-off conference, Mr. Yuji Akaba of Breakthrough Partners[J], who serves a judge of the committee and previously work with Silicon Valley-based VC Techfarm Ventures, says, social app market is a good opportunity for system engineers who wish to exit from the contract-based software development.   He introduced Silicon Valley’s social app provider Zynga who had become worth USD1billion in their market capitalization within 2.5 years since their launch. (see this my story for more about Zynga.)

Business plan entries are due noon of March 31st, Wednesday.   The app development tasks are required to be completed in three months after the plan is passed, and the apps are opened to the public in six months.   Corporate applicants who have been fundraised by VC(s) in three years, and all applicants having any social app which is ranked in the Mixi App’s most popular top ten are not allowed to submit entries.

Tags: Company, Japan, News by Masaru IKEDA
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Cerevo[J], the Akihabara-based tech start-up and manufacturer of the Internet-enabled home appliances, started the sales of the spin-off version of the company’s hot-selling camera CEREVO CAM yesterday.   The version is called Cerevot, and it has an embedded speech synthesizer that can make it speak something when you release the shutter or turn the flash on.   Available at the company’s online store for 22,222 yen, which is equaled to USD240.

There are two options of black or white as the version.  The white one lets you hear the voice of “Iizu Share” performed by voice actress Haruka Tomatsu[J], and the black one is ‘”Ageru Oto” performed by Norio Wakamoto[J].   The company’s president Takuma Iwasa says, “People who love gadgets and home appliances are very close to anime fans in terms of their tastes.   This trial personifying our product by using characters is intended for hooking their interest.”

White type: Iizu Share performed by Haruka Tomatsu

Black type: Ageru Oto performed by Norio Wakamoto

See Also:

• Cute Girl Duo Gets A Higher Attention Than What They Promote

Tags: Company, Japan, News by Masaru IKEDA
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On Wednesday, Tokyo-based tech start-up, Flight System Consulting[J] released the iPhone/iPod touch app that allows you to listen to Japanese community FM radio services over the Internet, in association with CSRA[J] or Community Simul Radio Alliance.   The app costs 350 yen.   At the time of the app’s release, nine stations participating in the alliance can be tuned in, and all 36 member stations will be available by this summer.

The app is available only at Japanese AppStore, but it has no geographically-based access restriction, that’s why you can tune in radio programs with it regardless of whether you’re in Japan or abroad.

The current version has the feature showing you weather update as well as tuning in radio programs.   The coming future updates will support additional features including video broadcast,  link shortcut to the iTunes’ page of the tune being aired, and link to e-commerce sites selling local specialties in the area of the station that you’re currently tuning in.

According to Taro Kimura, the well-known news anchor and the president of CSRA, the proceeds from the app sales are mainly allotted for system integration cost.   Radio stations participating in this service get no financial profit from the app sales because buying the app needs to be taken same with buying a portable radio for clearing copyright issues. (If radio stations got profit from the app sales, they might be required to pay additional copyright license fees.)

Tags: Cellular Phone, Company, Japan by Masaru IKEDA
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Yahoo! Japan announced [J] that their last year acquiring video streaming service Gyao [J] got investment from TV Asahi Corporation(TV Asahi), Tokyo Broadcasting System Holdings, Inc.(TBS), TV TOKYO Corporation(TV Tokyo), Dentsu Inc. and Hakuhodo DY Media Partners Inc.

Yahoo! Gyao already was invested by Nippon Television Network Corporation(Nippon TV) and Fuji Television Network, Inc.(Fuji TV), this means all 5 major commercial TV networks in Japan will own stake of web broadcasting capable company.

Dentsu and Hakuhodo (Hakuhodo DY Media Partners are jointly invested by three ads agencies including Hakuhodo.) are 2 biggest advertising agencies in Japan. Both of them are close to those commercial TV networks, and Japanese internet ads networks such like Yahoo and Google.

By this, Yahoo! Gyao may be able to enhance its TV program distribution, like Hulu doing in USA.

Tags: Japan, News by Akky Akimoto
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