Yahoo makes a lot of money in Japan

Yesterday, Yahoo Japan (Japanese only) released a press release basically stating that earnings in this country skyrocketed from April to September 2007.

According to Yahoo, sales went up 17,2 percent to 117,74 billion yen (compared to the same time frame in 2006). That is 1 billion USD (720 million Euros)! Sales from advertising alone soared 27 percent to 54 billion Yen (473 million USD/332 million Euros)

Yahoo said that compared to the same time frame last year their net profit rose 9,2 percent to 29,27 billion Yen (254 million USD/178 million Euros).

Read a little more about Yahoo Japan in this post (please scroll down).

Web 2.0 Expo in Tokyo takes place next month

I just sent out my registration for the Web 2.0 Expo in Tokyo (other locations include San Francisco and Berlin).

The organizers expect no less than 4,000 attendees for the event which takes place on November 15th/16th in Shibuya. This district in Tokyo is also known as the "Japanese Silicon Valley" since a lot of IT firms and Web companies are located there. Speakers include people like Tim O'Reilly and Joichi Ito.

I am sure the Expo will be super-interesting. Expect a full coverage on Tokyotronic from the perspective of a future web entrepreneur ;)!

Techcrunch Japan author's opinion on CEATEC 2007

As blogged earlier, I met some authors from the Techcrunch empire at this year's CEATEC, Asia's biggest exhibition for IT and electronics.

If you know Japanese, please read Japanese Web 2.0 guru Umihiko Namekawa's san opinion about the show and our get-together with John Biggs from Techcrunch (another article is here).

Amongst others, Namekawa-san is an editor for Techcrunch Japan. Both of his blogs (Japanese only) are excellent.

Yahoo Japan brings the web to HD-TVs

Japan is a leading producer of TVs. Everyone knows that. Also, everyone heard a lot of marketing bla-bla in the last years about "merging technologies", "bridging digital gaps in the living room" and, of course, browsing the web on TVs. Obviously, this will be the case one day.

And Japan might be on the forefront of this development. And people here really mean it. In September, a high definition video-on-demand service was launched on the Japanese web TV site acTVila (Japanese only). acTVila is backed by the Japanese government, Sony, Matsushita, Sharp, Hitachi and Toshiba.

Screenshot: acTVila home page


Yahoo aims for HD TV
Now, Yahoo Japan is aiming specifically at the HD TV market. The company plans to launch an Internet portal designed for display on HD televisions as early as this Japanese fiscal year (ending March 31st, 2008).

Yahoo is working together with electronics giant Sharp on "Yahoo! HD for AQUOS" for big-screen TVs in "full HD"(1.980x1.080 resolution).

I saw a demonstration myself at CEATEC in Tokyo 2 weeks ago. The companies displayed selected content from Yahoo Japan's web site on a Sharp Aquos HD-TV. The content could be browsed smoothly by using an Aquos remote controller.

Now, displaying photos, maps, restaurant info etc. from Yahoo Japan's own web site on a large TV screen might make sense but it doesn't sound too sexy (for screen shots and technical mumbo jumbo, please click here).

However, this is only a first step. In an obvious second move, Sharp and Yahoo will add video distribution to the service later. Does this mean Japanese users will be able to watch Joost on their HD-TVs soon?

The companies are also hinting at integrating social networks and instant messaging as a third step! As of now, its unclear if this plan includes Yahoo-only services like Yahoo 360 or if there will be Facebook or MySpace in HD.

Interesting prospects but I am not sure if users want to browse the web on their TV sets in the first place. However, Yahoo Japan, Sharp and those technology-crazy Japanese people: This is one combination that might work. Accordingly, Yahoo Japan plans to acquire no less than 1 million users per month by the end of next year. I will keep you posted on this topic.

Yahoo Japan rules the Japanese internet
In Japan, Yahoo is by far the most popular web site. Some people even claim Yahoo Japan is the Japanese internet.

The company is controlling some 65% of the search market here. The Yahoo portal had 41.1 million uniques in August 2007 while Google Japan only had 30.9 million. The ROC in the last 5 years is 43% annually on average. Sales climbed 47% to 1.8 billion USD last year and profits surged a whopping 59% annually since 2001.

Interestingly, Japanese telecommunications giant Softbank holds 41% of Yahoo Japan while Yahoo itself controls 34% and is thus a minor shareholder!

Techcrunch, myself and the CEATEC

I went to CEATEC yesterday, Asia's biggest exhibition for IT and electronics.

Hmm, what should I say: It was cool, but not really that exciting. Sony's OLED TV was the biggest sensation: 2,88 mm (MILLIMETERS) thin. But the prototype is very small and reminded me of a car navigation system screen. I am sure Sony will make something of this in the future though.

The aftermath
After the exhibition closed, I was invited by John Biggs to a reception at a near-by hotel. John is writing for the almighty Techcrunch imperium (he is also editor-in-chief for CrunchGear).

We were joined by Umihiko Namekawa, the Japanese Web 2.0 guru. Namekawa-san is a blogger, author and also responsible for Techcrunch Japan. I also met Tadashi-san, senior editor at Gihyo, a publishing company (web, software, technology etc.).

We all went to Tokyo City after the reception and had fun in Quentin Tarantino's favorite Japanese bar. For a picture and details, go to CrunchGear.

Web 2.0 in Japan - German guest article

As a "guest", I contributed an article to zweinull.cc about the current status quo of Web 2.0 in Japan.

Zweinull.cc is a pretty famous blog about the Web 2.0 world. However, it is written entirely in German - just like my entry. In case you may wonder: I am a German.

The article centers on the Top 3 of Web 2.0 in Japan:
1) Mixi, the enormously popular social network
2) Nico Nico Video, the Japanese Youtube "killer"
3) Hatena, Japan's most famous social bookmarking site

In the near future, I will extensively review all of these sites here on Tokyotronic (in English).

Review: Japan's biggest Social Shopping community Kakaku

This review features a web site that I myself use excessively and which every Japanese knows of: Kakaku.com (the whole site is Japanese only). Kakaku (価格) roughly means "price", so what may sound cool to Westerners sounds kind of bland to Japanese ears. It is one of the most famous shopping sites in the country.

Kakaku is nothing less but Japan's biggest web site for price comparison. However, it is not a mere directory -which would be useful enough, given the tremendous amount of items listed- but a social shopping site. And every product listed on Kakaku can be rated and discussed by registered users: Very useful!

I will briefly review the site in the following order:

I) Starting Page
II) Product search
III) Web 2.0/Community aspects
IV) Business Modell
V) Opinion


I) STARTING PAGE

The starting page is HUGE (typically Japanese). It is actually full of ads and looks like this (parts A-D):

Starting page (parts A+B):




Here you can find: A search box, different categories, new products, company news, rankings etc. Please notice my FF plug-in blocks some of the spaces used for ads (I didn't turn it off).

The categories feature every consumer product you can think of: Food, electronics, sports etc. However, restaurants, appartment buildings (mainly in Tokyo), funeral services (!), schools (!) etc. are included as well.

Starting page (part C):


In the community box, you can find featured discussion topics from Kakaku users as well as selected reviews.

The box on the bottom left features "news" from participating companies and shops. However, those companies (in a more subtle way) advertise their products here.

Kakaku research is a side product. The company uses its site to conduct surveys and compile reports about different product related topics. The newest research report for example centers on Japan's mobile market. 2,404 users contributed to the survey which lead to that report. The aim of this section is to find popular products and concepts in a certain field.

Campaign is actually another way of advertising. For example, if you subscribe to a mail magazine, chances are you receive a coupon from Amazon (through a sweepstakes).

Starting page (part D):

Kakaku.com magazine is a bimonthly online, well, magazine. Actually, it is just another way of advertising and then selling stuff. The value of the information given is not really high.

News from Akihabara is for the nerds. In the "Cosplay" section for example, users can inform themselves about how the girls at the Tokyo Game Show booths were dressed this year.


II) PRODUCT SEARCH
Now, if you click on one the first entry (music instruments/gakki: 楽器) in the "hobbies" -category (highlighted in starting page, part A above), you will see the following page:

Product search (part A):


Some of the latest comments in the section for musical instruments are displayed , along with some reviews. Kakaku itself adds news articles which fit the category here.

Product search (part B):


The discussion forums are particularly popular. The featured ranking on screen B is on electric pianos/denchi piano: 電子ピアノ. Kakaku does NOT decide which pianos appear on the ranking. Only the users do: Web 2.0, there you go.

After clicking on the No. 1 product (the Privia piano), the following page appears.

Product detail page (part A):


In part A, the diagram in the rating box features details of the product like design, usability etc. The maximum amount of stars users can distribute to each of these factors is 5.

Product detail page (part B):


The box highlighted in red in part B has the following contents: price in Yen, shipping fees, availability, shop ranking, shop name, location and date of entry/comments.

After clicking on the cheapest offer, you get to the "final" page where you can see user satisfaction on the corresponding shop (100% would buy again in this case) and other details.


Clicking on the red button brings you to the shop's page where you can finally buy the product.


III) WEB 2.0 / COMMUNITY ASPECT
Kakaku would lose much of its appeal without user contribution. Important community aspects on the site include:
- Users are welcome to write reviews on the site.
- Users can rate every product offered by Kakaku partner shops. It is also possible to rate other people's reviews.
- The shops themselves register their products to the site.
- Users can introduce themselves to the community with personal profiles. Reviewers can be subscribed to.
- Kakaku also offers a BBS for its users which is heavily used.

IV) BUSINESS MODEL
The business model is quite simple: ads, ads, ads and even more ads. They simply put ads mainly in banner form and "disguised" as news/information/campaigns ALL over the place!

There is not a single page on Kakaku without ads. However, they do not seem to be too annoying since they are partly product-related. And one maybe subconsciously expects a lot of this stuff on a product comparison site.

The company also runs a lot of side businesses!
For example, Kakaku offers a loan comparison service. That means not only do they offer price information but users can also apply for loans, credit cards etc. via the web site. You can actually search for the offer which fulfills your needs best. So Kakaku applies their principal method of price research for consumer products and more or less taps into Japan's multi billion dollar loan market. Smart move and they really mean it. The loan section is quite comprehensive and detailed.

They also collaborate with a travel web site, a movie portal and a hotel reservation site amongst others. Also, they are also engaged in real estate!

The business model alone would be worth 2 blog posts!

V) OPINION
In my opinion, Kakaku is not perfect but the site comes close. It is a very useful Web 2.0-product which just makes sense from a user's and business point of view. A great mash-up of shopping, social network, discussion forum and information.

What impresses me most is the site's usability even though there are hundreds of thousands of products listed in dozens of categories. No hassle, no frustration in finding the information you look for. I can accept the ad load for that.

PS
The site was heavily revamped (and improved!) just today, October 1st, 2007. By the way, in the top left you can see that Kakaku became 10 years old this year (Kakaku.com 10 歳).

CEATEC exhibition in Tokyo starts tomorrow

Tomorrow the CEATEC starts at Makuhari Messe just outside of Tokyo: Robotics, electronics, IT and technology in general. That is mainly the stuff to be exhibited.

I will attend the CEATEC but I am still not sure on which days to choose. Some of the conference and speech slots are still open.

Hopefully some interesting web-related concepts will be displayed and maybe some interesting people will be there, too. I will post my impressions here later this week.