Japan’s competitive mobile market is taking some of the air out of high flying DoCoMo’s performance, reports the Wall Street Journal.

bq. Japanese cellphone provider NTT DoCoMo Inc. posted gains in net income and revenue for the latest fiscal year but forecast its first drop in annual revenue in its 12-year history as prices fall in Japan’s increasingly competitive mobile phone market. The current fiscal year looks less rosy for DoCoMo, a unit of Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp. It expects revenue to fall 2.5% to Ä4.92 billion in the year ending March 31, 2005. What’s more, the company expects operating income — revenue less the cost of sales and administrative expenses — to drop 25% to Ä830 billion.

The company is locked in a price war with KDDI and Vodafone KK and will soon launch a plan “that allows for unlimited e-mailing and data downloading for a monthly fixed price, following a similar plan launched in November by KDDI.”

There is still a tiny big of good news.

bq. DoCoMo forecasts net income to rise 15.5% to Ä751 billion, mainly as a result of the expected sale of its stake in AT&T Wireless Services Inc., which the company said is still under negotiation.