Hitachi, NEC, Casio in Talks to Form Mobile Phone Tie-up
September 03, 2009
Japan's Hitachi, NEC, and Casio Computer have reportedly begun talks over integration of their mobile phone operations in the Japanese market, according to an August 20 Kyodo News report. It is reported that NEC is mulling spin-off of its mobile phone business and merge it with an existing venture named Casio Hitachi Mobile Communications by taking a majority stake in the venture. Should the merger proceed as planned, which is slated for as early as April 2010, it will put the Hitachi-NEC-Casio conglomerate at number two in terms of market share in the Japanese mobile phone market, behind Sharp and ahead of Panasonic. The three companies said that so far no final decision has been reached. At present, NEC mainly provides phones for mobile operators including NTT DoCoMo and SoftBank, while Hitachi supplies the au-branded phones for KDDI and Casio's customers include KDDI and SoftBank.