CDMA-based iPhone to Hit Chinese Market
Deutsche Bank lately issued a report, saying that China Telecom Corporation Ltd. will launch iPhone that is compatible with the CDMA technology, whose chips will be supplied by Qualcomm Inc. and production will be taken over by Foxconn Technology Group.
Analysts believe that the promotion of CDMA-based iPhone in China is one important step of the global expansion of Apple Inc. Although the country currently only accounts for less than 10% of the gross revenues of the company from iPhone around the world, it has great potential for future growth.
Apple is believed to change its strategy to have exclusive cooperation with one certain telecommunications carrier in one country. For example, in China, the company has set up two regular chain stores in Beijing and Shanghai, no more solely depending on the sales network of China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd. alone.
Since Apple tenders the olive branch to China Mobile Ltd. and China Telecom, the latter certainly welcome the good intention. The Shanghai branch of China Mobile begins to exchange Micro SIM cards for users of iPhone 4 and iPad from now on till October 18 and present them with top-up cards for their mobile phones.
Apple plans to Sell iPhone 4 in China
Apple is planning to launch iPhone 4 in China and is also in discussions to open two new Chinese stores with its partner China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd. this week amid growing competition from rival Smartphones. The device will attack the market on September 25. Official Apple stores will sell contract-free 16GB and 32GB models for US$743 and US$892. The company will add a store in Beijing and one in Shanghai on the same day.
According to Analysts International analyst Fang Li, the world’s biggest technology company by market value is expanding in China, which overtook Japan last quarter to become the second-biggest economy globally. Demand from Chinese consumers for the iPhone, which faces competition from Smartphones made by local vendors including Lenovo Group Ltd. and Huawei Technologies Co., has lagged behind expectations.
Fang explained that the iPhone is expensive compared with other devices in the market. There are many Smartphones that offer comparable features and performance, but are priced much less.
According to the company, U.S. consumers can buy the phone for US$299 with an AT&T Inc. contract.
In Beijing, a store will be opened in Xidan Joy City at the same time as the iPhone 4 goes on sale. In Shanghai the store will be opened in Hong Kong Plaza.
Users finding new innovative use of WWW in the Emerging Markets
Recently a report came in to being, according to which, customers in the world’s biggest emerging markets are budding extensively different practices and likings in their use of the internet, posturing challenges to multinationals’ marketing policies.
China’s internet users which are more than 400 million, the world’s largest online population works on web generally for instant messaging and online music, videos and games which is far different from other parts of the world. Whereas, users in Russia and Brazil are quite mature as they focuses on search engines and for mailing.
According to David Michael, managing director at BCG in Beijing, Habits vary widely between users in China, India, Russia, Brazil and Indonesia. One fault is to assume that users in these markets are not online, that they’re behind, and another is to assume that if they’re online, one can just transfer the existing online marketing strategy to those countries. About half of all internet connections in India are dial-up slow and expensive, therefore if you go online there, you log on, check mail, and log off again, whereas in China you might be online all day.
The varied content on offer in India’s traditional media makes online entertainment less attractive than in China, where consumers can find content online which they would not find in the state-owned traditional media.
Nokia Siemens wins contract from China mobile
Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) has been selected by China Mobile to organize its IMS Core platform, hiQ MMTel application server and Session Border Controller (SBC) to introduce the converged communications experience designed at improving end-user satisfaction.
As the first phase, Nokia Siemens will install its IMS core platform and multimedia voice applications for corporate customers in Beijing, Yunnan, Jiangxi, Xinjiang, Hunan and Fujian.
In the future phase’s the company will expand IMS core network and will offer addition multimedia applications such as video sharing and multimedia conferencing.
The operator hopes to provide users a flawless experience to access multimedia application irrespective of the devices or network they are using.
IPad a big hit in Asian Grey Market
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The booming “gray market” trade in the world’s most talked-about high-tech gadget, iPad could not be stopped although its maker Apple didn’t launch it in Asia. Millions of pads have been sold by Apple within 28 days and about a thousand of them made it to Asia.
IPads are on sale for a substantial mark-up on the U.S. retail price from Singapore to Seoul, Bangkok to Beijing. In the stores in Hong Kong, one can get 15 of the basic 16-gigabyte models for HK$5,700 Hong Kong (about $733) each while the same model retails in the U.S. for $499.
In Low Yat Plaza, one of Kuala Lumpur’s centers for cheap electronics and gadgets, every other mobile phone stall had iPads for sale like 16GB, 32GB or 64GB version and the prices ranged from $750 to $1,100. According to most of the sellers they got their iPads from a few dealers with small retail shops in the U.S., and Apple’s failure to supply the device outside the country was fueling the unofficial trade
Google’s presence in China looms in danger
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Google’s dream to rein the mobile web market is facing a severe repercussion from the censorship battle it is fighting with Beijing costing more than its stake in the regular Internet in China.
Last week, in order to evade Beijing’s vast army of censors, Google re-routed its Chinese search engine traffic to its Hong Kong site. This has made many mobile operators and handset manufacturers to turn their backs on the US firm.
Google revealed previously that its mobile Internet services were “partially blocked” in mainland China, but it was not immediately clear whether the interruption was a retaliatory move by China, or a service glitch.
Country’s top cellphone operator with 533 million subscribers, China Mobile refused to comment on its future status with Google. China Unicom on the other hand has decided to remove Google’s search function from new handsets. Handsets makers might also exclude Google search function from mobiles powered by the US firm’s Android operating system to placate Chinese operators.
According to analysts, while Google no longer makes any money from Android, the technology was shared with other firms through the Open Handset Alliance; it loses a competitive advantage if its search engine is not part of the package.
Bridgewater to participate in LTE Interoperability Tests
Bridgewater has announced that it will be participating in the Global MultiService Forum (MSF) interoperability testing event. This event will take place at Vodafone’s Centre for Test and Innovation in Dusseldorf and the China Mobile Research Institute Lab in Beijing. The focus of the testing is on validating Evolved Packet Core network interfaces to enable multi-vendor deployment strategies for LTE (Long Term Evolution) technology.
The MSF event will promote and foster compatibility and interoperability with leading network equipment vendors and operators including Vodafone, China Mobile, NEC, Starent Networks, Huawei, ZTE, Alcatel Lucent, Agilent and Codenomicon.
The event will prove out to be an important step towards validating MSF architectural framework release 5 for LTE, developed to incorporate 3GPP System Architecture Evolution.
Google scraps unveiling event of Nexus One in Beijing
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: A regional event to show software developers its first smartphone, the Nexus One in China has been scraped by Google.
An event introducing the sleek touchscreen phone to software developers in Hong Kong and Taiwan will be held next week, but Beijing will be excluded from the list. It is viewed as Google’s second move following the threatened pull-out from the China. Earlier, citing problems of censorship and a hacking attack, Google threatened to shut its Chinese Google.cn portal and pull back from China.
Shortly after that the launch of two mobile phones in China which use its Android platform were also delayed. Many staff at Google’s China operations is worried about their jobs due to the recent standoffs.
Google is currently looking to fill dozens of jobs, including sales, business development and research and development in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, according to a job post on its website.
China Mobile, Larger Than Vodafone, May Say Net Rose (Update2)
Aug. 16 (Bloomberg) — China Mobile Ltd., the world’s largest cellular operator by market value, may report a 23 percent gain in second-quarter profit after adding a record number of subscribers.
The Beijing-based company, which overtook Vodafone Group Plc as the world’s largest mobile company by market capitalization last month, will report net income rose to 15.7 billion yuan ($2 billion) from 12.8 billion yuan a year earlier, according to the median estimate of six analysts in a Bloomberg survey. China Mobile is scheduled to report earnings tomorrow after the 4 p.m.market close in
Hong Kong.
Chief Executive Wang Jianzhou raised revenue by offering a wider range of wireless phone services such as movie and video downloads and targeting the more than 900 million people living in
China’s rural areas. The mobile operator added 13.1 million users in the second quarter, gaining a record number for three straight months to June.
“With the continued growth of subscribers and strong growth of data revenue,” earnings will keep rising, said Mandy Chan, who helps manage $1 billion at ABN Amro Asset Management Ltd. in Hong Kong, including China Mobile shares.
China Mobile attracted users after it received approval from the telecommunication regulator to cut rates and offer cheaper monthly packages for cell-phone users in
Beijingstarting May. The operator also reduced international roaming charges in the provinces of
Sichuanand
Zhejiang.
The phone operator is expected to report half-year profit rose to 30.2 billion yuan from 24 billion yuan a year earlier, analysts said.
Share Price China Mobile’s market capitalization on July 11 was $132 billion, compared with Newbury, England-based Vodafone’s $110 billion. The Chinese company’s shares have risen 38 percent this year, compared with a 23 percent decline in Vodafone stock.
“The share price reflects the market’s view of the prospects of the companies in the future,” Francis Cheung, an analyst at CLSA Ltd., said. “There’s more growth potential in
Chinathan in
Europe, where the market is more mature.” China Mobile, which lags behind Vodafone and
Japan’s NTT Docomo Inc. in sales, may say second-quarter revenue rose to 69.4 billion from 59.6 billion yuan a year earlier.
The company, which offers global system for mobile communications, or GSM, services, gained 25.8 million subscribers in the first six months of the year for a total of 273.8 million, about two-thirds of the nation’s mobile-phone users. That’s more than Vodafone’s 186.8 million users and Docomo’s 51.9 million combined by the end of July.
User Revenue China Unicom Ltd., the country’s second-largest mobile operator, offers services using both the GSM and code division multiple access standards. Unicom had a total of 135.1 million users at the end of June. China Mobile’s average revenue per customer, or ARPU, an industry measure of the size of a phone bill, probably remained unchanged in the second quarter from a year earlier, and up from the previous quarter, analysts said.
We expect China Mobile’s ARPU to be driven by higher usage and wireless data contribution,” Kelvin Ho, an analyst at Nomura International (
Hong Kong) Ltd. said. Ho estimates China Mobile’s ARPU will be about 90 yuan in the second quarter, unchanged from a year earlier, and up from 86 yuan in the previous quarter. Usage per subscriber probably rose 10.8 percent from a year earlier to 363 minutes per month. Chief Executive Wang, 57, is boosting revenue from new businesses such as short message services, ringtone downloads and wireless services such as emails and games.
Data Services New businesses from such wireless data services may account for 23 percent of revenue in the first six months, compared with 19.7 percent a year earlier, Ho said. Competition also eased as fixed-line phone network operators China Telecom Corp. and China Network Communications Group Corp., slowed promotions of a city-wide cordless service called Little Smart, which has cheaper rates than for cellular calls, as they prepare for the government’s issuing of high-speed wireless licenses.
Chinahasn’t set a timetable for granting licenses for 3G services, which allow subscribers to video conference and download movies faster on their handsets. The Ministry of Information Industry on Jan. 20 said it has adopted the locally developed time division synchronous code division multiple access standard as one of the so-called third- generation services. “A 3G license could be further delayed into second half 2007, which implies the 2007 could be another safe year for China Mobile, and the company could still deliver stellar results until the beginning of 2008,” Wang Jinjin, an analyst at UBS Securities Co. said in a report. China Mobile shares rose 1.5 percent to HK$52.10 as of middayin
Hong Kong, after gaining as much as 1.7 percent earlier.
Source- http://www.bloomberg.com
Technorati : China Mobile, GSM, Hong Kong, Vodafone
Ice Rocket : China Mobile, GSM, Hong Kong, Vodafone
