Learnings from Japan’s mobile market

To an outsider, Japan’s mobile market presents a paradox. On the one hand, mobile phones are so ubiquitous that keitai culture (mobile culture) is an entrenched concept in Japanese society. On the other hand, even as smartphone penetration grows, feature phones remain stubbornly popular, according to recent eMarketer data. While some observers chalk that paradox up to Japan’s ageing population, my experience on the ground in Japan over the past two years tells a different story, one