Gmail is always looking to do more business, and it was a matter of time before they would allow (selected) companies to brand gmail as their own. Google has just licensed gmail to Japanese mobile operator KDDI.

The email service will be branded by KDDI and work on the "auone.jp" domain. Google will provide the backend for the service and account holders will have the same functionality as provided by Gmail itself, including 2GB of storage.()

Sounds like a smart move. I am not sure if other companies somewhere in the world were already allowed to brand google's email service, but it sounds logical to me. It is a great product, and will bring in nice money both for google and the branding company. And branding it mobile is even smarter, especially in Japan, where people are much more into the mobile world than we in the western world are.




A good article about the supbject is on Mashable.
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