Tags: Japan, Masayoshi Son, Softbank, South Korea, Taiwan, TV Bank, Yahoo, Yahoo!Doga

Yahoo! Japan collaborates with Softbank to launch Yahoo!Doga

Softbank Corp is joining hands with the Japanese arm of the search engine giant Yahoo! to form a company that would be broadcasting television programs via the Internet in the country. The aim is to tap the ever-growing market of web users connected to the internet with really high-speed connections.

Their joint venture is named TV Bank Corp and it would be providing a new streaming video service called “Yahoo!Doga”. They aim to establish a web portal offering a multitude of programming content containing movies, sports and music shows as well as drama series from Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea.

The new helped Softbank to improve its position in the share market. Even the shares of the search engine giant gained 5.04 percent to 146,000 yen. The move would put more pressure on the existing television networks in the country to think of the future and try out more avenues to telecast their shows.

Softbank Chief Executive Masayoshi Son said in a statement on their announcement: “Japan has the infrastructure for this kind of service, so it would be a shame not to use it. We think the way to go is to not try to control one broadcaster but work with all of them.” The service would be currently running in a trial phase and is expected to be officially launched in March 2006.