DeNA, who runs Mobage, announced today [J] that it instituted legal action to demand Gree and its CEO Yoshikazu Tanaka an apology and compensation for the loss caused by Gree's press release and Tanaka's comments, which stated that DeNA did illegal business activities.

As we reported in December, DeNA expressed [J] the possibility of counter action against the legal action filed by Gree and KDDI (Bloomberg). Tanaka has been making comments around the case on many media, opinion ads on national newspaper and his Twitter [J].

Tags: Japan by Akky Akimoto
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January 25, two of Japan's largest social networking service companies, DeNA(who runs Mobage) and Mixi announced their new alliance on social commerce.

On the release, it is said that "Mixi, who holds networks of close friends" and "DeNA, who has plenty of knowledge on e-commerce and has been running Bidders (mobile shopping service)" are going to construct a new social commerce service in this growing sector.

Planned in late March, a mall-type social commerce service will be opened in Mixi. There are already some major companies, including Lawson HMV Entertainment, Sanrio(=Hello Kitty) and Cecil McBee decided to have their shops. Other companies are encouraged to contact them to join.

Whilst Gree, the rest of the big three, has been competing severely against DeNA's Mobage on social game platform (1, 2), Mixi and DeNA seemed to have friendly relationship by using phrases co-existence of "social graph" and "virtual graph".

But still, they are common in having social games on their own open platforms. The release does not have single word of "Mobage".

See Also:

Mixi's release [J]

DeNA's release [J]

Tags: Japan, News by Akky Akimoto
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2011 is over - reason enough to take a look at some of the key trends that shaped Japan's web, mobile, and gaming industries last year.

I could think, in no particular order, of five major developments that made a significant impact last year:

March 11 Triple Disaster
The triple disaster that hit Japan on March 11, 2011, highlighted the power and importance of social media and the web at large when it comes to communicating and sharing information with others - especially as the phone networks went bust immediately after the earthquake and made voice communication impossible.

Challenges remain, such as the digital divide (young vs. old people, users who are web-savvy vs. those who aren't, etc.) or the danger of mass-distributing false information through social media, but the web's "reputation" has clearly risen in Japan.

Internationalization
The list of Japanese web, mobile, and gaming companies that started expanding across borders (or bolstered their efforts) in 2011 is long: Rakuten, DeNA, GREE, Dwango's Nico Nico Douga, and CyberAgent are just the most prominent examples.

Quite a few startups are now creating services that are multi-lingual from the get-go (i.e. Sumally, Beatrobo, Crowsnest, etc., etc.).

The tech industry is maturing, Japan's population is greying, and entrepreneurs need to deal with saturated markets: expect internationalization to only pick up speed in the next years.

Android Revolution
The smartphone revolution started earlier than 2011 (mainly driven by the smash success of the iPhone), but it was during the last year that Android really started gaining a foothold in Japan. Just one example: SoftBank's winter 2011 cell phone line-up includes just one feature phone - but nine Android handsets.

Feature phones are still king in Japan, but market research companies like Tokyo-based MM Research are expecting smartphone shipments to outnumber those of traditional handsets next year.

Americanization
2011 is the year that Facebook started to become popular in Japan even though it will take at least another year to determine how sustainable the growth really is - not too few people think it has the potential to eventually throw market leader Mixi off the throne. Twitter has seen another massive boost in popularity after March 11 (see above).

In mobile, Google's Android and Apple's iOS are set to dominate the market in the next years - local mobile platforms have no chance in the foreseeable future.

• the removal of sim-locks in Japanese cell phones
• the termination of analog TV (and rise of connected TVs) after 58 years
• major Japanese video game makers going social,
• or ebooks slowly (but surely) gaining popularity in Japan.

Tags: Japan, Trend by Serkan Toto
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Yokohama DeNA Baystars, which became real on December 1st by an acquisition by DeNA, a company runs social game networking service Mobage, announced [J] the new team logo on December 9.

Its "DeNA" part is not so similar with the DeNA's company logo.

The former logo of Yokohama Baystars was this,

Yokohama Baystars was one of few pro-baseball teams which did not have owner company's name (which is TBS, nation-wide TV broadcasting network company). Most of 12 teams have a company name in it and the owners sponsor teams by seeing it as a part of advertising.

See Also:

Asiajin » Mobage Company DeNA Rumored To Buy A Pro Baseball Team, PR Denied

Asiajin » Social Game Networking Mobage Reported To Own Pro-Baseball Team In Japan

Asiajin » Yokohama DeNA Bay Stars – DeNA(Mobage) Agrees To Purchase Pro Baseball Team

Tags: Japan, Social game by Akky Akimoto
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A few weeks ago, I gave a presentation on Japan's social gaming sector, in which I am analyzing some key areas and companies (especially DeNA and GREE) of this rapidly growing industry.

In particular, the presentation is focused on the local social gaming market, the differences to markets in the US and elsewhere, and future trends.

Here's an updated (and slightly edited) version of that presentation for your reading pleasure (direct link):

Tags: Cellular Phone, Japan, Social game by Serkan Toto
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