Having failed miserably in the U.S. Disney plans to launch a mobile phone service in Japan next year offering customers animated content.
Disney will use mobile phone carrier Softbank Corp’s network and the two would jointly develop handsets, according to Nikkei business daily.
Disney’s entray into Japan as a mobile virtual network operator is likely to trigger further competition in an already saturated mobile market.
Disney aims to win 1 million users by targeting families with an offer of handsets and downloads featuring Disney characters. Hopefully the company will have learnt a few lessons from its launch in the USA which saw poor uptake and earlier this year the company announced it was withdrawing the mobile service and it announcing in September that the service would close at the end of 2007.
Disney will be the first company to launch a mobile phone service in Japan using another firm’s network.
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