Who'd have thought that a company that makes intercoms would be the cause of a new round of 3G iPhone rumors? Telecoms.com reports that Japanese intercom maker Aiphone, which has trademarked the "Aiphone" brand in Japan and a slew of other countries, has been chatting with Apple.

According to the story, in Japanese "Aiphone" and "iPhone" are similar enough for iPhone to be included in the Aiphone trademark. Now, Aiphone is saying that it recently came to some sort of agreement that would allow Apple to use the iPhone brand in Japan. So of course there's tons of speculation that Apple is indeed planning to tackle the Japanese cell phone market. And, as Telecoms.com points out, "given the technological landscape of the country," with major wireless carriers using WCDMA and EV-DO networks, it will probably be a 3G iPhone.