China will issue 3G mobile licenses and certificates after the restructuring of its six big telecommunications operators, according to Xi Guohua, vice minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of China.
The reorganization is expected to be completed in about six months.
At present, there are three 3G standards in the country: TD-SCDMA, WCDMA and CDMA2000. According to the restructuring plan, the TD-SCDMA license is expected to be awarded to China Mobile, while the CDMA2000 license and the WCDMA license will go to China Telecom and the new China Unicom respectively.
On whether foreign visitors to the Beijing Olympic Games will be able to use their WCDMA and CDMA2000 mobile phones, Xi said that foreign visitors will not be able to use their WCDMA and CDMA2000 EVDO mobile phones in China. This is because China has not issued the license for third-generation mobile phones. However, TD-SCDMA will be an exception.
As a test to enlarge the TD-SCDMA network and to fulfill China's promise to provide 3G services during the Olympic Games, China Mobile will launch a TD-SCDMA service during the Olympic Games. The service will be available to foreign visitors who rent special mobile phones.
China Mobile said it will offer at least 20,000 3G handsets for hire during the Olympic Games.
Commercial trials of the TD-SCDMA network--which started from 2007--are operating in six Olympic cities and four non-Olympic cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, Qingdao and Tianjin. So far, the TD-SCDMA network trials have provided over 95 percent coverage of the GSM network, which is a dominant 2G technology in China.
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