(Kyodo News International via NewsEdge) NTT DoCoMo and four others including Fuji Television Network and Sky Perfect Communications have decided to form a new company by the end of December to create television programs designed chiefly for mobile phones, sources familiar with the matter said.
NTT DoCoMo will tap the expertise of the broadcasters in the alliance, which also involves Nippon Broadcasting System and Itochu to upgrade its TV services as the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications is considering easing a ban on distributing programs for mobile phone-based terrestrial digital TV broadcasts that hit the airwaves this April.
The new broadcast service, the so-called one-segment, or 'one-seg' service can now offer only the same programs as those aired via regular TV at a given time.
But the communications ministry is considering lifting the ban in 2008 to allow the distribution of programs unique only to one-seg TV services.
The five partners aim, for example, to market products that appear or are advertised in one-seg TV shows through NTT DoCoMo's phone-based Internet i-mode service.
Also under consideration is the opening of a broadcast station dedicated to one-seg programming by using the bandwidth that will be freed up when analog TV broadcasting ends in 2011 as scheduled.
Earlier, NTT DoCoMo has teamed up with Fuji TV by acquiring a 2.6% interest in the broadcaster and has so far offered come-ons such as invitations to Fuji TV stations to subscribers to NTT DoCoMo's broadcasting service.
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