“The Japanese are turning to Apple’s iPhone as a source of ideas for how to rescue their ailing cellphone business, the head of a local think tank said today,” Electronista reports.

“Professor Takeshi Natsuno of Keio University told the New York Times that companies like Hitachi, NEC and Sharp have generally been unable to sell phones outside of Japan due to difficult, often highly customized interfaces and that the iPhone is a key example of how to solve the problem,” Electronista reports.

“Its emphasis on ease of use over hardware is believed to have made it more palatable worldwide and encouraged third-party app development that isn’t usually present in Japan,” Electronista reports. “‘This [iPhone] is the kind of phone I wanted to make,’ Natsuno admitted. He was previously best known for developing NTT DoCoMo’s i-mode Internet service.”

Full article here.