Japan’s largest mobile operator to establish Web3 consortium

NTT Docomo, Japan’s largest mobile operator with over $40 billion in annual revenue, partnered with multi-chain smart contract platform Astar Network to accelerate the Web3 implementation in the country. The joint effort will take the form of a consortium, which would give individuals and corporations the ability to utilize tokens for governance. 

According to a press release from Nov. 9, Astar Network and NTT Docomo have also specifically agreed to collaborate on three fundamentals. They will pursue sustainable development by researching case studies for environmental issues in Web3, try to eliminate technology gaps on the road to wider Web3 adoption by educating people and provide opportunities for engineers and business leaders to learn and gain practical experience.

Astar Network CEO Sota Watanabe said the project’s mission is to bring Web3 out of a narrow tech-savvy circle to the general public:

“In this context, more robust cases with excellent user experience on an infrastructure that is accessible to everyone is essential. It is about making a society where more people can truly enjoy the benefits of Web3, not just engineers.”

Recently, Japan, which ones roughly one-third of Docomos’ shares, has been showing a growing interest in Web3, crypto and decentralized finance (DeFi). On Nov. 2, The Digital Agency of Japan launched a research decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) to study Web3. In late October, the country’s second-largest port city, Fukuoka, partnered with Aster Labs to develop new use cases for Web3 technologies.

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While the country still has rather tough crypto regulations, its prime minister is quite vocal on the government’s plans for major investment in Web3 and metaverse initiatives. The Japan Virtual and Crypto Assets Exchange Association has also promised to make it easier for authorized exchanges to list digital currencies by loosening the screening process.