News Releases

HitachiSoft (Hitachi Software Engineering Co., Ltd. based in Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo with Takeo Ogawa as the CEO and president) agreed with FeliCa Networks, Inc. (hereafter called FeliCa Networks based in Shinagawa-ku, Tokyo with Souichi Kawauchi as the CEO and president) to participate in the "FeliCa Networks Partnership Program" in October 2004.

Social perception of FeliCa technology (Note 1) represented by digital money is remarkable now so as to be adopted in Edy and Suica, for example. In the future, it is expected to spread further in the security, management and card issuance field. With the launch of FeliCa-compatible cellular phones in July 2004, the importance of FeliCa technology in the mobile environment has been increasing.

FeliCa Networks Inc. is mainly conducting licensing related to development, production and sales of devices such as FeliCa IC chips for cellular phones and related OS as well as management of the mobile FeliCa platforms. HitachiSoft, having provided many FeliCa-related solutions as the primary distributor of the Cyber FeliCa Platform(Note 2)will start full-scale FeliCa business in cooperation with FeliCa Networks according to this agreement so as to propose better mobile FeliCa solutions.

HitachiSoft plans to positively promote this business, with \900 million as the mobile FeliCa sales target in fiscal 2005, mainly to service providers in the digital money, railway and cellular phone industries.

This program receives various types of mobile FeliCa-related information from FeliCa Networks, Inc. to provide service providers studying introduction of services and contents utilizing mobile FeliCa with general solutions, services and supports (Note 3).

Note 1) Non-contact IC card technology developed by Sony Corporation.
Note 2) Group of server products for constructing the FeliCa service in the Internet environment
Note 3) Major activities: Planning and proposing services making the most of mobile FeliCa, development of software (IC application) for cellular phones with built-in FeliCa functions, development of systems related to FeliCa reader/writer, management and support of FeliCa-related systems, providing solution service using "on FeliCa" remote issuance service, etc.

* FeliCa is a registered trademark of Sony Corporation.
* FeliCa is a non-contact IC card technology developed by Sony Corporation.
* Edy is a prepaid type electronic money service brand managed by Bit Wallet Co., Ltd.
* Suica Is a registered trademark of East Japan Railway Co.
* "on FeliCa" is the generic name of the network service for FeliCa chips provided by FeliCa Networks Co., Ltd.
* The formal name of HitachiSoft is Hitachi Software Engineering Co., Ltd.

Takehashi or Takano, Corporate Communications (PR), HitachiSoft
Tel: 03 (5780) 6450 Fax: 03 (5780) 6455 E-mail:press@hitachisoft.jp