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By John Lui, 27 March 2003 10:16

NEWS Mobile operator NTT DoCoMo has announced it has begun selling the Wristomo, a mobile phone worn on the wrist. While companies such as Motorola and Siemens have shown off working prototypes - and the UK famously demonstrated the pub-detecting watch - the Wristomo is likely to be the world's first wristwatch-phone sold commercially. As it built for the PHS (Personal Handyphone System) communications standard that is used only in Japan, foreign buyers won't find it very useful. The company said that is accepting pre-orders for the $290 phone on its website but do not say when the device will actually ship. To talk into the Wristomo, users have to unlatch and unfold it from the wrist, so that it becomes more like a normal clamshell-style phone - users do no speak into their wrists in Dick Tracy fashion. There is a small grayscale LCD panel on the device. The chunky, 18mm thick and 113g wrist-phone comes with PDA-like functions and can be synchronised with desktop organisers such as Microsoft Outlook. The makers don't say if there is a keypad on the device but it looks as if comes with a 'scroll-and-peck' button pad. For such devices, numbers are most conveniently entered on the PC first then downloaded into the phone's address book. The wrist-phone can also browse websites and get email through a 64Kbps downloads and a 32Kbps upload wireless data link. NTT DoCoMo claims a talk time of 120 hours and a stand-by time of 200 hours for the Wristomo. Siemens has demonstrated a working model of a concept wrist-phone for some years now but has not brought it to market. Engineers with the German firm have said that before such a product can be considered ready, the problem of data entry method has to be solved. Users won't stand for a tiny keypad and it is still hard to squeeze good voice recognition hardware into such a tiny appliance, they said. The minute LCD screen would also be considered unacceptable by users accustomed to larger colour displays. However, Siemens will adapt its wrist-phone technology for its new Xelibri pendant-phone line. John Lui writes for CNETAsia.