CF Wireless Card with Voice and 128 kbps Data Capability

NEC Infrontia have announced a new wireless modem that in addition to a 128 kbps flat rate connectivity capability features voice capability on a PDA. Here's the news on Windows CE Fan:

http://www.wince.ne.jp/frame.asp?/bbs/cnBoard.asp?PID=592

Although technologically this may be interesting news and I'm happy DDI and manufacturers are pushing forward new products and services I'm dubious about the real benefits for average PDA users. Everyone in Japan owns a phone anyway, and I feel using your PDA as a phone is going too far, although in the longer term PDAs and phones will most likely merge. I just can't imagine it being practical - current PDAs are just not designed to be phones. In addition, if you want to use your card a lot for data access then you wouldn't be able to use the phone function at the same time. I would guess this is just a step along the road to the eventual merger of phones and PDAs and it will be interesting to see how widely used it becomes in Japan.

It is also rumoured that NTT DoCoMo may be planning to start a flat rate plan for their popular P-in Comp@ct 64 kbps data cards in October: http://www.wince.ne.jp/bbs/device.asp (Japanese only): A later poster points out that DoCoMo's 64 kbps PHS cards have the big disadvantage that the 64 kbps PHS connection cannot be used while in motion, although the P-in Master does also have 9.6kpbs packet switched capability that can. The P-in Master can also make calls but cannot receive them. Will be interesting to see what the pricing is (expected around 5,000 yen) if the rumour is true and whether they come out with any new cards with improved features at the same time.

VoIP phone functionality for PDAs is more interesting as it potentially offers cheaper calls and an alternative to conventional mobile phones. Yozan and SkyWave are two companies in Japan pushing this forward. See this AsiaBizTech article and the others linked at the end.

For anyone who doesn't already know, MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger and ICQ are already available for Pocket PCs. In addition Microsoft also have research software called Portrait offering voice and video chat on a Pocket PC and this supports various existing standards.