Published in Mobiles

Fujitsu wants to flog its mobile operations

by on22 August 2017


One careful owner

Fujitsu wants to flog off its mobile operations as the Japanese information technology company faces stiff competition from bigger rivals in a highly lucrative mobile phone market

The company, which spun off its mobile phone operations into a separate company last February, has drawn interest from investment funds including Tokyo-based Polaris Capital and Britain's CVC Capital Partners Ltd and Chinese PC maker Lenovo, the Japanese newspaper Nikkei wrote.

First round bidding could open as soon as September, and is expected to bring offers in the tens of billions of yen (hundreds of millions of dollars), Nikkei reported.

Tokyo-based Fujitsu would stop developing and manufacturing mobile phones, but looks to keep a minority stake in the business and keep its mobile phone brand alive, the report said.

The company makes RakuRaku phones targeted at the elderly as well as the Arrows series and sells them mainly through NTT Docomo. It also has a full lineup of flip phones.

However, Fujitsu holds less than a 10 percent share of the domestic market and shipments in fiscal 2017 through next March are expected to reach 3.1 million units, less than half of the fiscal 2011 peak of eight million units.

The company hopes to keep the Fujitsu phone brand alive after the sale and will likely retain a share of Fujitsu Connected Technologies Ltd., its mobile phone manufacturing subsidiary in Kawasaki, the sources said.

Last modified on 22 August 2017
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