LONDON – Japan has revived plans for a mobile equipment chip joint venture but has come up with something smaller and less ambitious than a previous plan that was cancelled earlier this year.
NTT Docomo Inc. Japan's largest wireless carrier, Fujitsu Ltd., NEC Corp. and Fujitsu Semiconductor Ltd. have announced an agreement to form a joint venture to focus on the development and sales of semiconductor products with built-in modem functions for use in communications equipment.
The joint venture – Access Network Technology Ltd. – is majority owned by Fujitsu with Docomo and NEC each taking about a 20 percent stake in the venture. The company is scheduled to begin operations in August after capital contributions have been made.
The group is a subset of a larger group that announced a similar intention in December 2011 and which was cancelled in April 2012 (see
Docomo kills LTE joint venture).
Panasonic Mobile Communications Co., Ltd. and Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. were involved in the original plan, which was terminated because the group could not agree details by the target deadline of March 31. Renesas Electronics Corp. is a noticeable absentee from both the aborted plan and the current joint venture.
The objective of the formation of the joint venture is to enhance management responsiveness in the fast moving mobile digital market while bringing together diverse technologies from the individual companies, Fujitsu said in a statement. Fujitsu will hold 52.8 percent of the company with Docomo holding 19.9 percent and NEC holding 17.8 percent. Fujitsu Semiconductor will hold 9.5 percent. The company is headquartered in Kawasaki.
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