Yahoo Japan President and CEO Masahiro Inoue and eBay International President Lorrie Norrington shake hands after announcing their tie-up in online auction market in Tokyo Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2007.

So today Yahoo! Japan and eBay announced that the two companies would link up their services in 2008. This in turn will allow American bidders easier access to Japanese auctions, and vice versa.

Starting in March next year, Japanese consumers will be able to directly bid on international eBay items within Yahoo Auction Japan. And sometime in the middle of ’08, similarly, a site will be set up that will allow Americans to bid and buy Yahoo Japan auction items through the eBay site. Thus eBay will be your one and only proxy service for Yahoo! Japan.

Today the two companies have already launched the website Sekaimon (“gateway to the world”) that translates international eBay auctions into Japanese in order to help Japanese speakers deal with payment and shipping.

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