Rakuten, KDDI announce strategic tieup

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KDDI Corp and Rakuten Inc have reached an agreement to collaborate on electronic money. Both companies said that a strategic partnership centered on the Edy electronic money system operated by Rakuten will help them improve their electronic money infrastructures and lead to the expansion of other collaborations in business and operations in the future.

The two companies agreed to create the new Edy | au service. This new service represents a strategic linkup combining the checkout infrastructure owned by KDDI with Rakuten’s Edy service. This will be the first step in a drive by both companies to integrate more online and offline services, thereby providing greater convenience to au, Edy, and Rakuten customers.

For KDDI, this tie-up represents an extension of both its 3M strategy and global strategy, which are operated as part of its “More Familiar! More Diverse value! More Global!” vision. With the 3M strategy in particular, the company aims to organically combine mobile phone networks (3G/LTE), FTTH, CATV, WiMAX, Wi-Fi, and other networks to allow customers to listen to music, watch movies, or enjoy any number of other services even while on the go.

Given the increasing importance of open-environment devices, the company said it hopes to meet the usability needs of customers using every kind of device and network, providing safe and convenient services to all.

Rakuten, for its part, has since the company’s founding in 1997 established a solid position in the e-commerce market, with its Internet shopping mall, Rakuten Ichiba, as the flagship business. Amid the accelerating integration of offline and online services, Rakuten started the Edy electronic money service on January, 2010. Under the concept of the Rakuten Ecosystem for enhancing the synergistic effect between various services on the strength of assets of the Rakuten member database, Rakuten has been enhancing business cooperation between Edy and the Rakuten Group’s other services by issuing the Rakuten Card with the Edy function, introducing settlements of purchases on Rakuten Ichiba by Edy, and offering the Rakuten Edy smartphone application integrated with Rakuten’s core applications.

The company has also worked to increase customer satisfaction by allowing Rakuten and Edy users to charge their Rakuten and Edy accounts with either Rakuten Super Points or Edy Charge Points.