Rakuten wesentlich besser als Rocket
https://tokyointernationalmeetup.com/2025/05/19/rakutenmobile/
May 14, 2025
Rakuten Rewards, the cash-back shopping platform, has appointed Wendy Bergh as chief marketing officer (CMO). Bergh brings a track record of marketing leadership across high-growth e-commerce and technology companies. She will lead efforts to enhance the company’s member-focused programs and initiatives.
“I’m incredibly excited to join Rakuten Rewards,” said Bergh. “The business has a strong foundation, a loyal member community and significant opportunities for continued growth. I look forward to deepening member engagement by delivering more rewarding everyday shopping experiences while strengthening our value to merchant partners seeking to connect with our vibrant and active shopper base.”
Rakuten, founded in 1999, formerly Ebates, is a cash-back and shopping rewards company. Its revenue comes from affiliate network links. Members of the site click through affiliate links before shopping at a retailer’s site. The company reports earning its members $3.6 billion in cash back for shopping through Rakuten.
https://sgbonline.com/...en-rewards-appoints-chief-marketing-officer/
https://www.virginmedia.com/the-edit/tv/virgin-tv-channel-guide
9 hours ago
Mobile service is a basic necessity in Japan – including for those who hail from abroad. But for many international residents, between language barriers and puzzling paperwork, signing up for a cell plan can be a tricky undertaking.
Rakuten Mobile is changing that – and Japan’s global community is taking notice.
A recent survey by MMD Labo revealed that Rakuten Mobile is now the most-used carrier among international residents in Japan, claiming a 21% share – well ahead of the second-place provider at 15.6%. Even more telling: 25.5% of international respondents revealed that Rakuten Mobile would be their top consideration next time they switched carriers.
Word of mouth fueling organic growth
After just a few short years in operation, Rakuten Mobile has earned a reputation for good service among subscribers in Japan. Last year it won the top spot in the Oricon Customer Satisfaction Survey for the second year running.
“The fact that global subscribers are driving organic growth through word of mouth is a strong indicator that we’re doing something right.”
Yu Nishimura, Senior Manager, Rakuten Mobile’s Marketing Planning Department
Subscribers praise the simple pricing plans and quality of coverage – a product of expanded bandwidth, breakthroughs in 5G and rapid improvements in the fundamental technology driving the network. As of February 2025, Rakuten Mobile had surpassed 8.5 million subscribers in Japan.
Among non-Japanese subscribers, the recent survey highlighted two fundamental draws of the service: price and data capacity. Rakuten Mobile’s single, unlimited plan offers value that few competitors can match, especially for data-heavy users.
The survey also revealed that word of mouth is Rakuten Mobile’s most powerful marketing tool among global residents. New users are discovering the service not through advertising, but primarily through friends, coworkers and social groups.
“The fact that global subscribers are driving organic growth through word of mouth is a strong indicator that we’re doing something right,” remarked Yu Nishimura, Senior Manager of Rakuten Mobile’s Marketing Planning Department. “Subscribers are clearly seeing the value and telling others, which is the best endorsement we can hope for.”
Rakuten Mobile’s strong reputation is translating into real numbers. Non-Japanese subscribers now account for around 25% of all contracts, an 8% year-on-year increase.
Speaking your language
Rakuten Mobile’s success among Japan’s global residents is far from accidental: since launch, the carrier has made intentional moves to support non-Japanese customers. Specifically, the company has targeted long-standing friction points surrounding accessibility, pricing and usability.
Multilingual support is one standout example. Customers at Rakuten Mobile stores have access to support materials in English, Chinese, Nepali, Vietnamese and more. Multilingual leaflets help explain contracts and documents, while staff at some 162 stores around Japan use Pockettalk AI translators to aid communication further.
In May 2025, Rakuten Mobile expanded multilingual efforts even further. In addition to Japanese and English, the Rakuten Mobile website is now available in Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Indonesian and Portuguese.
“Overcoming the language barrier when signing up for a mobile contract has long been a challenge for global users in Japan” explained Nishimura. “We’re happy to see that our efforts to simplify the process and provide inclusive services are paying off.”
Setting a new standard
Rakuten Mobile has expressed a commitment to further improvements to international accessibility, aiming to set a new standard for carriers in Japan. Nishimura hopes that Rakuten Mobile’s multilingual success will serve as a positive example to Japan’s wider telecommunications industry.
“The success we’ve had in attracting such a broad, diverse base of customers gives us confidence that the product we offer is fundamentally appealing,” said Nishimura. “We hope other carriers take note. Accessibility shouldn’t be an afterthought – it should be an integral part of all services from the outset.”
https://rakuten.today/blog/...-residents-choosing-rakuten-mobile.html
1 day ago
https://rakuten.today/blog/...nnects-inspires-affiliate-industry.html
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/N5G.F/
Rakuten owning 50% of Rakuten Bank = $4 billion
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/ASTS/
Rakuten owning 31 shares of ASTS = $1.1 billion
AST SpaceMobile Inc. (ASTS) is helping shape the future of global internet connectivity through its ambitious satellite-based technology. With the potential to expand reliable internet access to remote and underserved regions, support growing government contracts, and meet the rising demands of data connectivity across industries, satellite internet is emerging as a transformative force in communications (and the stock market).
The market for satellite internet is projected to grow rapidly, with analysts estimating it could reach $24.6 billion by 2030, representing a compound annual growth rate of 30%. ASTS stock is following this trend, recording a surging 14% gain over the past week and a 47% gain year-to-date.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/...e-stock-asts-rallies-190600745.html
Jefferies Adjusts Rakuten's Price Target to 900 Yen From 730 Yen, Keeps at Hold
Published on 07/25/2024 at 05:30, updated on 07/25/2024 at 05:31
https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/...Keeps-at-Hold-47466927/
Separate folders for chats with customers, business calls and search by category: Viber launches new features for small businesses in Ukraine
11 June 2025, 11:542025-06-11
Rakuten Viber is launching new free features to help small businesses in Ukraine more effectively communicate with customers and promote their services. The updates are part of Viber Business Profiles, launching in Ukraine in the fall of 2024. Business Profiles allow small business owners to maintain their online presence and more effectively engage customers.
https://dev.ua/en/news/rakuten-viber-1749631531
https://www.facebook.com/infobip/videos/...en-viber/1746442729239450/
Taking telco AI ops to its iPhone moment
By Keith Dyer 12 June 2025
AT&T expansion is just the beginning of Rakuten Symphony's ambitions in AI operations, as it eyes a future iPhone moment for the AI user interface.
After MWC 2024, TMN wrote about how AT&T was adopting new site management software from Rakuten Symphony to digitise and automate the process of deploying, upgrading and managing sites across its network.
At the time, we quoted Igal Elbaz, SVP, Network CTO, AT&T saying that there were around 7,000 users of Rakuten Symphony’s Site Management software amongst those responsible for deploying and managing its sites, with the software replacing a large number of legacy systems. Elbaz also said there was potential for AT&T to expand its use of Rakuten Symphony’s automated solutions.
He said, “There has been a lot of benefit already in the migration from the old systems to the new system… We’re very excited about this and are thinking about where else we can extend that capability in other parts where we are doing engineering and build."
Today Rakuten Symphony and AT&T have announced an expansion of their work together, with the operator giving an wider role to Rakuten Symphony’s Site Manager within its processes for managing its Open RAN site re-build, as well as fibre site rollout. A release from the two companies said AT&T has extended a multiyear collaboration agreement to expand adoption of Rakuten Symphony Site Management to accelerate AT&T’s Network Simplification Transformation project and 5G Open RAN deployments.
https://the-mobile-network.com/2025/06/...i-ops-to-its-iphone-moment/
AT&T extended a partnership with Rakuten Symphony to spur the development of its open RAN network by simplifying operations across legacy systems to support cell site functions.
The operator is using Rakuten Site Management to streamline operations and replace the legacy systems, allowing AT&T to optimise productivity for its open RAN build.
After announcing a $14 billion open RAN deal with Ericsson in 2023, AT&T’s goal is to move 70 per cent of its 5G network traffic across open hardware by late 2026.
The plan includes scaling its open RAN environment this year.
Rakuten Site Management provides a workflow driven end-to-end process orchestrator for site planning, design, compliance and construction.
It is currently in use by more than 10,000 registered users within AT&T and its contractors.
The operator is also using Rakuten Site Management to orchestrate its fibre expansion plans.
https://www.mobileworldlive.com/rakuten/...ll%2520site%2520functions.
By Anshul Bhatt
Chief Product Officer, BU Intelligent Operations
June 12, 2025
https://symphony.rakuten.com/blog/...s-for-faster-smarter-deployments
Fri, June 13, 2025
AST SpaceMobile Inc. (ASTS) is helping shape the future of global internet connectivity through its ambitious satellite-based technology. With the potential to expand reliable internet access to remote and underserved regions, support growing government contracts, and meet the rising demands of data connectivity across industries, satellite internet is emerging as a transformative force in communications (and the stock market).
The market for satellite internet is projected to grow rapidly, with analysts estimating it could reach $24.6 billion by 2030, representing a compound annual growth rate of 30%. ASTS stock is following this trend, recording a surging 14% gain over the past week and a 47% gain year-to-date.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/...e-stock-asts-rallies-190600745.html
06 June 2025
Cloud-based digital transformation is no longer an additional option, but has become a fundamental need. The IDC Indonesia report (2024) shows that the public cloud market in Indonesia is estimated to have the potential to reach a value of US$ 1.38 billion or Rp 22.48 trillion by 2025. This number grew with the previous year's growth (year-on-year growth) of 20.5 percent. Meanwhile, in Indonesia, cloud computing penetration is expected to grow by 75 percent. This number is driven by the increasing demand for digital transformation in the public and private sectors.
Responding to these challenges, Rakuten Symphony, together with national system integrator PT Alita Praya Mitra, presented a new approach through a seminar themed "Resilient Edge Computing for Data Sovereignty & Modern AI Workloads". The event, which took place at Park Hyatt Jakarta, on Wednesday (4/6), was attended by various stakeholders in the technology industry, such as the Director General of Digital Ecosystem of the Ministry of Communication and Digital (KOMDIGI) Edwin Hidayat Abdullah, Aju Widya Sari as the Director of Artificial Intelligence and New Technology Ecosystem of KOMDIGI, who was also the keynote speaker in this seminar, as well as more than 100 participants from the government and corporate sectors. The seminar aims to explore real use cases of edge computing and Software-Defined Storage (SDS), discuss the transition from legacy virtualization platforms to Kubernetes-native architectures, address the demands of local data regulation and national security, and foster strategic collaboration between industries. According to the Director General of Digital Ecosystem of KOMDIGI, Edwin Hidayat Abdullah, the development of the digital economy must also carry the principle of justice. "Don't let only new tech but there are no incentives for data centers or infrastructure," he said. Meanwhile, President Director of Alita and Chairman of the Indonesian Internet of Things Association (ASIOTI), Teguh Prasetya, said that Alita now continues to focus on strengthening edge platforms, IoT, and smart solutions for the government, manufacturing, and public service sectors. "We believe the partnership with Rakuten will accelerate the adoption of cloud-native and edge AI more widely," he said. He emphasized that currently Indonesia's digital transformation, edge computing technology and AI are the key in supporting data sovereignty and operational efficiency across sectors. He emphasized that with the presence of global investors and local initiatives for AI, we are at an important moment to strengthen the development of the national digital ecosystem. On the same occasion, Global Head of Sales, Rakuten Symphony Inc, Udai Kanukolanu explained, by combining Alita's local expertise and infrastructure and cloud as global innovations from Rakuten Symphony, OSS, and open RAN, Rakuten seeks to accelerate the adoption of digital services in the future nationwide. "This initiative is in line with Indonesia's vision of empowering digitalization in the future, encouraging economic growth and technological advancement," he said. He highlighted Rakuten's global success in delivering an AI-ready platform that is proven to be efficient and compliant with local regulations. "We have supported more than 40,000 global retail locations, critical healthcare, and 5G open RAN network orchestrations in various countries. Now is the time for Indonesia to take a similar leap," he explained. Rakuten Cloud SVP Anirban Chakravartti explained that edge computing and AI are no longer a trend, but an urgent need in the era of data speed and regulatory demands. He explained that Rakuten designed a cloud-native infrastructure capable of running AI workloads at the edge, with automated orchestration and layered security. Various scenarios for the use of edge computing are now starting to be found in various retailers. For example, supply chain optimization in the retail industry, automation and the use of robot technology in the manufacturing sector, to disease diagnosis in the health sector. He revealed that 83 percent of organizations or companies are currently planning to run AI/ML in physical locations, to improve their business and business operations. SquirtIt does not make their operations more operationally efficient. In the midst of continuous technological developments, data sovereignty is now one of the factors that is a concern. Data sovereignty is important because it concerns national control, information security, digital economy independence, and the realization of justice for access to technology. Meanwhile, the Chairman of the Artificial Intelligence Industry Research and Innovation Collaboration (KORIKA), Prof. Dr. Hammam Riza emphasized the urgency of building infrastructure that supports data sovereignty and inclusive digital transformation. "With an edge-native cloud developed locally, we can ensure that AI and digital data serve the nation's interests, not just become consumers of foreign solutions," he said.
https://www.indotelko.com/read/1749124476/...ormasi-digital-indonesia
By Mouzam Nasiri, Ecosystem Leadership Rakuten Symphony
June 10, 2025
Joining Rakuten Symphony has been a thrilling leap into a mission that truly excites me — leading our ecosystem strategy to connect Rakuten’s 70+ products with telecom operators across the globe, co-creating value, and shaping what’s next.
In 1997, Rakuten launched with a bold idea: that technology, when designed with purpose, can empower people and redefine industries.
It started with Ichiba, a pioneering online marketplace. Today, it has evolved into a global ecosystem of 70+ products and services spanning e-commerce, fintech, communications, content, and more.
What’s remained constant? A customer-first, human-first philosophy that puts real people — not just products — at the center of every experience.
The ecosystem mindset: from telcos to transformation
At Rakuten Symphony, our focus isn’t just on showcasing what we’ve built — it’s on working with telecom operators to reimagine what’s possible together.
We’re not in a race to productize. We’ve already arrived at the destination.
The focus now is on activating value through strategic partnerships, unified experiences, and solutions designed to scale.
This is not a pitch deck. It’s a playbook, refined through years of operational discipline we call Shikumika — Rakuten’s unique approach to scaling innovation with repeatability and speed.
What we’re delivering together
This model isn’t aspirational — it’s already in motion. And it's helping operators:
· Expand their offerings from connectivity to digital lifestyle services.
· Co-create value across commerce, finance, content, and identity.
· Deliver unified, scalable experiences rooted in real human behavior.
· Move beyond vendor relationships toward true strategic alignment.
· Bridge global capabilities with local relevance.
We’re helping turn networks into ecosystems and services into shared growth platforms.
https://symphony.rakuten.com/blog/...s-powering-the-future-of-telecom
On the same occasion, Rakuten Cloud's SVP, Anirban Chakravartti, explained that edge computing and AI are no longer just trends, but urgent needs in the era of data speed and regulatory demands.
He said that Rakuten designed a cloud-native infrastructure capable of running AI workloads at the edge, with automated orchestration and layered security.
Various implementations of edge computing are now starting to be seen in various sectors, such as supply chain optimization in the retail industry, automation and the use of robots in the manufacturing sector, to disease diagnosis in the health sector.
Anirban said that 83 percent of organizations or companies currently plan to implement AI/ML in physical locations to improve business and operational efficiency.
https://www.liputan6.com/tekno/read/6045391/...nesia-pada-2025?page=4