TOKYO—East Japan Railway, the leading railroad operator in Japan, on 1 May said it would launch a new service letting mobile users use their phones as train tickets beginning in 2003 at the earliest.
Once the system is introduced, users of mobile phones with built-in contactless integrated circuit (IC) chips can hold their phones over ticket gates to pass through the train gates. To get the ticket data on their mobile phones, users can download certain ticket data from ticket machines at stations.
According to a spokesman of East Japan Railway, the firm is in talks with more than one mobile operator to launch the service. There are three mobile operators in Japan—NTT DoCoMo, KDDI and J-Phone.
East Japan Railway in November 2001 launched a contactless IC card service. Users of the IC cards, called Suica, can go through train gates by holding the IC cards over the gates. As of 1 May, 3.7 million such contactless IC cards have been distributed, of which 2.05 million are commuter passes, and can be used at 470 East Japan Railway stations.
East Japan Railway is in talks with other railway companies for expanding the contactless IC card services to other railway systems including subways.
