Fujitsu & Toshiba could merge their mobile phone business

Fujitsu and Toshiba recently announced to be in conversations for merging their mobile phone businesses according to close sources to the deal. This transaction would create the second largest mobile phone manufacturer in Japan. Through this strategy both companies would be able to share the large development costs in the shrinking Japanese Market.

This union is a clear strategy to confront market leaders Nokia and Samsung Electronics as well as the fast growing Apple mobile phone business and RIM's Blackberry business, both of which are growing at a huge pace.

It is quite strange that this transaction takes place now, since it is not the best moment in the capital markets for a transaction of this nature. However, market pressure sometimes is enough to push deals through and right now it seems to be one of those moments. Time will judge how good the deal is for both manufacturers and more importantly, for their customers (current and future ones).