DOCOMO to enhance cloud services for smartphones and tablets

Technology Oct. 15, 2012 - 06:24AM JST ( 9 )

TOKYO —

NTT DOCOMO Inc will enhance its docomo cloud services for Android smartphones and tablets from November by upgrading its popular voice-command personal agent service, Shabette-Concier, and introducing cloud-compatible versions of the phonebook and email services for DOCOMO Android devices.

Shabette-Concier is an advanced voice interface that allows users to acquire information and operate handset functions by speaking naturally into a smartphone. The upgrade will enable the service to respond more accurately by taking into account user attributes such as age and gender, and by nearly doubling the searchable information categories to over 30. Categories for maps, train timetables, driving directions, horoscopes and many others will make DOCOMO’s agent service more personal and practical than ever.

DOCOMO also will expand the number of apps and voice-operable phone functions to over 100, a more than tenfold increase. Apps for Map, Disaster Kit (disaster-related messaging services) and many others, plus a wide range of newly added handset functions, will make the voice interface especially useful and handy. Over 30 popular characters will be added as avatars that users can have fun interacting with. Each avatar speaks and responds in its own distinctive voice thanks to the same cloud technology that processes all voice synthesis over the DOCOMO network.

The free Shabette-Concier service, which requires subscription to DOCOMO’s sp-mode Internet connection service, will be preinstalled in DOCOMO’s 2012 Winter smartphones and tablet to be released starting in November.

The new “docomo phonebook” service for DOCOMO devices will be synchronized with the cloud phonebook server whenever the user changes their profile, such as phone number or email address, and will easily restore phonebook data if the user changes handsets. Viewing and editing the cloud-stored data with a PC will be possible from February 2013. A sp-mode subscription is required to use docomo phonebook.

Also, the new “friendsnews” function will feed a friend’s SNS updates to their page in the user’s phonebook, even if the user does not have an account with the particular SNS service. Twitter, Facebook and other SNS services are compatible. Another new function will enable user-designated friends to be alerted via the cloud server whenever the user updates their profile.

DOCOMO’s sp-mode email service for smartphones and tablets will be upgraded with a refined user interface as the cloud-compatible “docomo mail” service, starting with the Winter lineup. Users will enjoy synchronized email settings for folders, read/unread status, etc. for multiple devices including PCs. The free app, which requires a sp-mode subscription, also will be available for download from January 2013 for all DOCOMO devices running Android 4.0 or higher.