Japanese firms NEC Corp and Matsushita Electric Industrial Co said Thursday they agreed to set up a new joint venture to develop mobile phone handsets operations.
The joint venture, capitalized at 100 million yen (857,000 dollars), will be equally owned by the two Japanese companies after its launch in October with an estimated 40 employees.
NEC and Panasonic Mobile Communications Co, Matsushita's mobile phone unit, will cooperate on developing handsets and a common software and hardware platform but they will design, manufacture and market the handsets separately.
"The joint venture aims to allow both companies to share ideas to drive Japan's technology," NEC president Kaoru Yano told reporters.
The two companies first started working together on the development of mobile telephones in August 2001.
