Our users are avid blackberry users and we will be opening up shop in Tokyo by the end of the month. To the best of my knowledge they don?t use CDMA/GPRS in Japan. Are there any alternative blackberry or mobile data devices that work in Japan? Tmobile says they have a roaming partner but I need to have a 3G phone? Do I I just take the sim out and put in this 3G device?

That's right. There's no GSM in Japan. Instead, you need to use a UMTS 2100 capable phone which is the 3G standard and frequency range used for 3G roaming in Japan. You need to get an unlocked 3G handset and also certainly some kind of UMTS/3G capable SIM card. If I recall correctly, GSM SIM cards should work as well but normally these would be GSM/UMTS SIM cards in one SIM.

You can then put it into the 3G handset. T-Mobile probably has a roaming agreement with Vodafone Japan or NTT DoCoMo. I'll let one of the experienced UMTS colleagues reply in greater detail. DRNewcomb is one such member but he announced that he won't be back here for some time.

Look at the just released Nokia E61. It is sect-band (GSM 800/900/1800/1900 + UMT 2100). It will work in Japan. It supports a variety of wireless e-mail standads including Blackberry Connect, Good, Intellisync, and Microsoft Push Mail. The Blackberry software is not out yet, but will be a free download on about two weeks.

The phone will work as close to everywhere anything I currently know of. By the way, the phone also has wi-fi as well which adds another possible tool. Note, however, that based on my understanding of how a Blackberry works, you might not be able to get it to work over wifi without assistance from your network carrier.