Andy of the PowerPage Japanese bureau writes about the next generation of IR public telephones recently launched in Japan:

I was at Haneda airport yesterday, and spied a new NTT phone I’ve never seen before. It’s quite a bit smaller than any of the greyphones, and accepts not only the standard 105 unit NTT cards, but also the IC cards used mainly for international calls. It’s really no bigger than a large desktop phone, but mounted vertically. It also sports an analog jack and the IR port. I took a picture if you are interested. Looks good too…..has a brown receiver that almost gives the impression of wood (though not as much in the pic), and the base appears to be stainless steel.