China Telecom and China Netcom likely to get a TD-SCDMA license

January 10, 2007

SinoCast reported that China Telecom and China Netcom, the two telecoms big players in China's mainland, will probably get first-batch licenses of TD-SCDMA, sources said.

Senior official with Ministry of Information Industry of China stated that the two fixed network carriers will gain mobile licenses along with China Mobile, largest operators at home, in order to balance the domestic carriers'power. What the official said stimulated mainland China's telecoms stock in a big way; by the end of last December, shares of China Netcom had soared more than 30%.

Analysts believed the issuing day of 3G licenses will come soon after the first beta period of TD; meanwhile, MII first said yes to the TD testing result of Datang Telecom, a Chinese high-tech enterprise.

It is said that the second-round TD test will be unveiled in this March; Olympic cities including Beijing, Qingdao, Xiamen, Tianjin, Shanghai and Hong Kong are all in the list.