DoCoMo to offer flat-rate data

Various media, chiefly the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, are reporting that NTT DoCoMo is to launch a fixed-rate data plan later this year. Price would apparently be in the low-Y4,000s per month, the same as rival KDDI. DoCoMo apparently won't confirm this at the moment.

At present DoCoMo offers several data packages where you essentially buy a chunk of data (Y4,000/Y6,000/Y8,000) at a cheaper per-packet rate than the standard plan; the cheaper packet charges also apply once you use up your allowance. We find using the Y4,000 package that it's pretty much impossible to use up our allowances, though we do tend to steer clear of video clips.

However, with content coming in ever bigger chunks--video, Java, Flash--we suppose that not having a flat-rate plan would have eventually ended up squeezing the content side of the business, as users would tend to hold back from downloading content if they found they were blowing out their monthly allowance and incurring extra charges.

[Read: Reuters article]

[Via the Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Japanese)]