Japan: mobile base tops 105.8 million end-December

According to data published today by Japan’s Telecommunications Carriers Association (TCA), the country’s incumbent mobile operators collectively added a net 400,200 new users last month to end the year with a total 105.825 million mobile subscribers. Softbank Mobile recorded 135,200 net additions last month, compared with 36,000 for KDDI’s ‘au’ brand, and 120,400 for the country’s leading operator by subscribers, DoCoMo. At the start of this year, DoCoMo had 54.16 million customers, ahead of KDDI with 30.55 million and Softbank Mobile with 19.99 million. The market’s newest entrant eMobile added 108,600 new users to end the year with 1.12 million, while the leading PHS operator, Willcom, had 4.57 million customers, up just 1,300 from a month before.