OREANDA-NEWS. Fujitsu announced that it is providing Fujitsu Ubiquitous Services Karada Life Walking Support to Ohtawara City in Japan's Tochigi Prefecture. This service will support the city's health promotion plan called "Ohtawara's three million steps to encourage walking," which will commence in May 2013.

Karada Life Walking Support uses the Smartphone Pedometer application developed by Fujitsu, as well as related system information, to effectively and continually promote better health. The system uses each participant's own smartphone to automatically log distance walked, and then graphs the results. It also offers fun ways to encourage people to keep walking, such as by tracking the distance walked as a virtual walking tour around famous locations in Ohtawara City or along the journey that the 17th-century haiku poet Basho recounted in his famous work, "The Narrow Road to the Deep North."

Fujitsu today also launched this service as a health promotion support option targeted toward municipalities throughout Japan.