Wireless
providers looking for reassurance that consumers will become
enthusiastic users of advanced mobile features like wireless Web,
ringtone downloading and more look to Japan as the starting point. Here’s the proof.

To
say that mobile phone users in Japan are more likely to use their
phones for Web browsing than their US counterparts is an
understatement. The NPD Group
found that just 12% of US mobile phone users go online through their
phones, significantly less than the 76% of users in Japan who are
surfing the Web through their wireless handset.

Japanese consumers are also more likely to use wireless mobile
email, ringtone downloads, PDA functions, graphics and screensaver
downloads, mobile gaming, picture messaging, digital music listening,
video messaging, and mobile TV and video.

There’s more: Japanese consumers are using a wide array of
phone features rarely used in the US, including barcode readers, GPS
and an analog TV tuner.

One key to the increased use of advanced mobile features is that Japan is also a leader in wireless protocol technology. Strategy Analytics
finds that they lead all other countries when it comes to the use of
W-CDMA and EV-DO. The 28.2 million Japanese who use these standards
represent about one-third of mobile phone subscribers in the country.

But is the US just a little behind Japan in technology take-up,
or is the market fundamentally different? NPD seems to lean towards the
latter, though it notes that the US may still follow Japan in the end.
According to Neil Strother, research director for mobile devices:
"Japanese consumers are using wireless services today that will find
their way to US shores in the future, but they also use their mobile
phones differently than Americans. When it comes to mobile phones,
Japanese consumers are always on the lookout for the latest technology
trends. Japanese carriers are falling over each other to provide the
most advanced features to remain competitive. While the US market lags
a bit in this regard, given the fact that Americans are also highly
susceptible to coveting the latest and greatest communications gadgets,
we can expect the domestic mobile phone market to react in a similar
way to new leading-edge features."

To get a full overview of this market and others in the Asia-Pacific region, read the Asia-Pacific Wireless report.