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Backed by history - and a great deal of technology  - Fujitsu, Japan's largest computer company, is hoping to make itself felt in mainstream markets, particularly North America and Europe. The competition is bound to be tough but the company's  top executives are hopeful.

The Fujitsu Forum 2005 was where the company displayed many of its innovative technologies and ideas for the future.

Fujitsu president Hiroaki Kurokawa,  in his keynote address, said the computing and network connections were becoming ubiquitous the world over. 'No matter where you are, you will connect to IT,' he said. How well  those connections were made would depend on the performance of the 'front-line people'.

'Change comes from the front line, so we must enforce the front line,' said Mr Kurokawa, referring to the troops of  everyday users of the technology.

Fujitsu certainly has a variety of technologies from small consumer-oriented items to mainframe computers that vie with IBM at large companies.

Avneesh Saxena,  vice-president of computing systems at IDC Asia/Pacific, said Fujitsu had more than proved it could produce the technology and the solutions; its biggest problem by far was  its inability to market  its products.

'This company has a lot of potential. It has the hardware and software, and implementing solutions is not that difficult for it. Fujitsu is slowly talking the same language as the rest of the market,' he said.

Mr Saxena said Fujitsu must let the world know what it did. 'The biggest thing the company needs to do is create the awareness. It must communicate in the language the market understands.'

One step in that direction would be to  speak a language which will make the world sit up and listen.  Tired phrases like 'ubiquitous society' -  heard many times at the recent event in Tokyo -  are virtually redundant. The same could be said for 'frontline people'.

Despite the less-than-stimulating vocabulary, Fujitsu demonstrated a range of impressive solutions. The company makes palm-vein recognition scanners, a method of identifying individuals quickly and accurately, and hopes to put  them into mobile phones soon.

Mr Saxena said the company was among the world leaders for RFID solutions - technology that is growing in popularity. Mr Kurokawa said the company was working on improving the range of radio frequency identification (RFID) technology. 'The range for RFID now is about 60cm,' he said, adding the range shown at the forum was four metres.



Fujitsu aims to take on the world's top players