Playboy Expands Wireless Distribution to North America
NEW YORK – Playboy Enterprises Inc. on Dec. 2 announced a deal to expand content distribution via wireless within the United States. With the addition of the U.S., Playboy now offers wireless entertainment services through licensees in 17 territories around the globe, including Germany, the United Kingdom, Australia and Brazil.
Under the new agreement, Dwango Wireless, a developer and publisher of entertainment content and applications for mobile phone users, will provide Playboy-branded content on-demand to more than 170 million North American wireless subscribers. Starting in early 2005, Playboy fans will be able to experience the classic Playboy lifestyle through custom content including Playboy-themed games, images, video clips, voice clips, and ring tones.
"Given the extraordinary success we've had with our wireless offerings around the world, we felt the time was right to expand our wireless content to the millions of U.S. subscribers," said Randy Nicolau, president of distribution for the Playboy Entertainment Group. "Dwango has both the technological expertise and marketing savvy to develop and distribute our mobile entertainment content, and we are confident that they will be a great partner in this venture."
"Dwango Wireless is extremely excited to work with such a well-known and respected lifestyle brand like Playboy to deliver first-rate entertainment content that people can access via their mobile devices. The Playboy Mobile service in North America will focus on fun and high-quality content ranging from games to images and mobile music to video," said Alexander Conrad, president and COO of Dwango Wireless. "Playboy enthusiasts will soon have the ability to select from a diverse library of content that fits their unique interests. Playboy has had great success in international mobile markets, and we believe the brand is strongest in the North American marketplace. Consumers are going to love this service!"
Playboy Enterprises is a brand-driven, international multimedia entertainment company that publishes editions of Playboy magazine around the world; operates the Playboy and Spice television networks and distributes programming via home video and DVD globally; licenses the Playboy and Spice trademarks internationally for a range of consumer products and services; and operates a network of Web sites including Playboy.com.
Dwango North America offers a comprehensive approach for bringing lifestyle and affiliate brands to the wireless arena through customized entertainment content, ringtones, games, and applications for mobile phones. Dwango Wireless provides unique content for major brands including ESPN Bassmaster and X Games, and Rolling Stone. Dwango North America holds exclusive technology and trademark licenses from Dwango Co. Ltd. of Japan.
IDC Finds Emerging Market for Graphical Content on Mobiles
FRAMINGHAM, Mass. – Graphical content has emerged in 2004 as the fastest-growing mass market for wireless data, a new IDC study reveals. While smaller than ring tones and games in terms of revenue, the market for commercial graphical content –wallpaper, caller ID graphics, screensavers, and special-use graphics – is poised to grow from just under $150 million this year to more than $1.1 billion by 2008.
While adoption of ring tones moved to the mainstream in 2003, graphical content has only now begun to make similarly dramatic strides in the market. Color-screen phones, richly animated graphics, improved user experiences from a network-and-accessibility perspective, and fresh new content are coming together this holiday season to rapidly accelerate customer adoption, according to IDC.
"Graphical content such as wallpaper is phenomenally popular, especially among youths and young adults," said Lewis Ward, senior research analyst in IDC's Wireless and Mobile Communications program. "Our survey data found that members of this demographic group are five times more likely to pay for and download graphics than are their adult counterparts. Furthermore, bundling graphical content with other similarly themed content should become prevalent over the next few years, as will tying such content to movie and album releases, all of which should propel revenue through the content ecosystem."
Despite these emerging opportunities, growth in graphical content will be constrained by relatively low penetration levels of advanced handsets (those capable of supporting graphical innovations such as rich animation and full-motion video), a lack of digital rights management (DRM) standards, a lack of cross-carrier shortcodes that could be utilized to easily deliver "impulse buy" graphical content, and relatively low user awareness of the availability of such content.
The results of the IDC study are outlined in the company's report, U.S. Wireless Wallpaper and Graphical Content 2004-2008 Forecast.
Wireless Community Networks Forum Descends On Miami Dec. 7-8
WASHINGTON – More than 100 prominent telecom executives, 400 users and potential users, and 22 speakers will meet in Miami Dec. 7 and 8 for a cutting-edge event focused on fast-emerging WiMAX, Wi-Fi, and other wireless community networks and related government-funded enterprise networks that use high-speed, high-capacity services to deliver Internet and related IT and telecom services. The forum, to be hosted at the Inter-Continental Hotel, will be presented by the Wireless Communication Association International (WCA), a non-profit trade association for the wireless broadband industry.
Collocated events Dec. 6-10 will be attended by eight heads of state from Caribbean and Central American nations, in addition to more than 400 executives from the region's telecom, IT, banking, tourism, textile, and energy sectors.
The topics to be addressed include:
♦An overview of current success stories in the U.S., Caribbean, and Latin America in the fields of residential and business networks, municipal networks, and enterprise networks.
♦The program manager for one of the world's most ambitious government-initiated community wireless network projects will discuss the City of Philadelphia's widely reported and controversial plan, "Wireless Philadelphia," which aims to create low-cost wireless Internet service throughout the sixth-largest U.S. city. The "digital city" iniative will support economic and social development designed to close the digital divide.
♦High-level executives from the WiMAX Forum, The Management Network Group, Intel Corp., NextNet Wireless, IBM, Motorola, Alvarion, WaveRider Communications, Airspan Networks, BelAir Networks, B-Quad Communications, and Proxim will discuss the vital role of broadband wireless.
♦WiMAX Campaign Manager Joe W. English of Intel Corp. will describe the WiMAX Forum's progress in uniting industry leaders who are committed to the open interoperability of all products used for broadband wireless access and the relationship of WiMAX to complementary technologies like Wi-Fi and cellular.
Founded in 1988, WCA is the non-profit trade association for the wireless broadband industry, with 250 members on six continents. The License Exempt Alliance (LEA) was founded in 1999 within WCA to represent license exempt providers and their vendors of broadband services, including fixed, mobile and enterprise networks.
