BUSINESSWEEK ONLINE : JANUARY 17, 2000 ISSUE
INTERNATIONAL -- ASIAN COVER STORY Why Japanese Are Mad for i-mode TOMORROW Internet cruising speeds will soon get a lot faster on i-mode. More than 300-kbps should be possible by next year. And by 2003, peak speeds could hit two megabits--fast enough for high-quality music downloads, Webcasts of TV shows, virtual-reality games using the phone as a Net link, and real-time videoconferencing. TODAY DoCoMo's i-mode cell phone service lets subscrbers swap e-mail and pictures, search phone directories and restaurant guides, and download news, weather, and horoscopes. Users connect to the Net at 9.6 kilobits per second--far slower than a PC on a phone modem. But unlike a PC or other Web-browsing phones, the i-mode systems are always connected to the Net. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _					RELATED ITEMS Amazing DoCoMo (int'l edition) ASIAN COVER IMAGE: DoCoMo TABLE: Why Japanese Are Mad for i-mode PHOTO: DoCoMo's i-mode Phone CHART: DoCoMo's Unearthly Flight...And a Share Price to Match Staking a Claim in Japan's Net Gold Rush (int'l edition) ONLINE ORIGINAL: What's It All About: An i-mode Primer (int'l edition) ONLINE ORIGINAL: DoCoMo's Keichi Tachikawa on i-mode and Beyond (int'l edition) ONLINE ORIGINAL: ``It Could Obviate the Need for Cable'' (int'l edition) INTERACT E-Mail to Business Week Online

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