Japan and China are soon to enter into a cooperation agreement, whereby both countries will jointly develop next-generation technologies for use in mobile phones. Beyong the traditional exchange – Chinese companies will get technology transfer and Japanese companies will get market access – the collaboration should extend to public-private research on 3G and 3.9G technologies.

In a related annoucement, the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) and the China Academy of Telecommunication Research (CATR) are entering a partnership – GO4IT China – for testing technologies, a move aimed at ensuring global interoperability of future information and communication technologies.

Both moves illustrate well the concept of coopetition - cooperation between potentially competing entitiescoopetition.