The launch of the new Apple AAPL -2.23% iPhone 7 clearly signals that the company is looking to raise its profile in – and through – Japan.

Wednesday’s unveiling include the introduction of Apple Pay in Japan, the launch of a Super Mario game for iPhone and iPad and collaboration with Sony .

All point to an increased focus on the Japanese market, as well as the potential for leveraging Japanese tech to increase Apple’s global popularity, and bolster global iPhone sales figures.

Apple looks for payday with Pay

For the Japanese market, the biggest announcement was undoubtedly that Apple Pay will be made available in Japan from this fall.

As Ralph Jennings points out in his excellent Forbes analysis of the announcement, Apple could quickly catapult itself to a position as a big player in the massive Japanese market for mobile payments.

I sometimes refer to Japan as a country that spends half its time in the 1950’s and the other half in the future.

When it comes to mobile payments, it is solidly in the future. It has had these kinds of solutions for many years.

It also has a population that is very happy to use mobile payments, as pointed out in a 2011 Accenture study, quoted by Jennings. The study says that 33% of active Japanese mobile users had used their phones to make payments within the last six months.

47 percent said that they favoured it as a method of payment. The same number for USA and Europe was 26 percent.

Apple is already very popular amongst Japans’ 106 million mobile phone users. Adding the extra feature of contactless mobile payments makes them even more so.

It also puts Apple into a great position in regards to secure revenue from the mobile payments market in Japan, which could reach $15.3 billion this year. Incidentally, that is roughly the equivalent of Apple’s new European tax bill

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Apple goes gaming through Japan

Another major announcement from the release was that a new Super Mario game will be coming to iPhones and iPads.

The game, called Super Mario Run, is set to be released in December. It will, at least initially, only be available on iOS devices.

Apple also announced that the upgraded Apple Watch will be able to run Pokemon Go, also from Nintendo .

The new iPhone 7 seems to have an increased focus on gaming with an A10 processor that Apple has described as able to deliver “console level” games.

The news has some gaming sites claiming that Apple ”has just changed the shape of the gaming industry“.

I think that might be an overstatement, but it seems clear that Apple is aiming to increase its presence in the lucrative market for online and mobile gaming, using the Nintendo games in general – and the exclusive Super Mario game in particular – as a battering ram.

Japan in Apple

In relation to both gaming and mobile payments, Apple is collaborating closely with Japanese companies.

With gaming, it is Nintendo, while Apple Pay’s release in Japan relies heavily on Sony.

Incidentally, Sony has delivered camera sensor hardware to a number of iPhone generations.

The Japanese version of Apple Pay in Japan will not use the near field technology that it relies on in other markets. Instead it will use a system called Felica, which is developed by Sony.

Felica already drives Japanese contactless mobile networks like the Suica card. By piggybacking on the Felica technology, Apple gains access to a payment system Japanese already use to pay their commute, for everyday items in stores and to make payments, through the country’s 1.9 million payment terminals.

“Japan’s major financial brands will support Apple Pay, too, meaning it will work in the country’s largest stores, as well as neighborhood shops and restaurants,” TechCrunch reports.

The collaborations seem to show Apple applying two opposite strategies in relation to Japan.

In regards to Sony and payments, the company is clearly focused specifically on the Japanese market. It seems to be gaining almost immediate access to the Japanese consumers. It also happens to get in just before its main international rival for mobile payments through phones, Google, whose mobile payment app is also headed for Japan.

The collaboration with Nintendo also works well with the Japanese market where characters like Mario and the Pokemons are dearly loved.

However, as Pokemon Go has clearly demonstrated, there is a worldwide appreciation of Japanese games and gaming characters. It is a craze that Apple will likely be hoping will boost its global iPhone sales in the run-up to Christmas. And perhaps kickstart the next worldwide gaming craze.