China Wants TD-SCDMA to Take 20% of 3G Market by 2020

The Chinese government is seeking to push its home grown 3G standard overseas and has set a target to take 20 percent of the overseas 3G subscriber market by 2020. The plans were revealed in a long-term development plan for mobile communication drafted by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), an industry expert has told the Interfax news agency. 

The news comes just days after a couple of Taiwanese networks, Chunghwa Telecom and Far EasTone expressed an interest in testing the TD-SCDMA standard on their networks.

Li Shihe, an advisor to Datang Mobile - which is a major TD-SCDMA developer - said that MIIT also wants TD-SCDMA to gain a share of more than 50 percent of the domestic 3G market. As China Mobile is the sole network using this technology, it seems that the network operator's dominant position in the market is not expected to be challenged by either China Unicom or China Telecom.

Shihe noted that the bulk of any expected growth would have to come from developing nations as Europe and the Americas are too far down the route with WCDMA and CDMA networks. He expect the Chinese government - through state controlled banks - to provide financial support to vendors selling TD-SCDMA infrastructure and handsets to overseas networks.

On the web: Interfax

Posted to the site on 10th June 2009