Operators Announce May 2008 Subscriber Totals
Marbridge Consulting, 6/20/08
China's four main telecom operators have announced their subscriber totals for May 2008.
Mobile subscriber uptake was down from April's total of 8.9 mln to 8.6 mln in May. Of this total, China Mobile (NYSE: CHL; 0941.HK) added 7.5 mln subs - slightly under its monthly average of 7.55 mln during the first four months of 2008 - to reach 407.0 mln. In contrast, user uncertainty over the post-restructuring operations of China Unicom's (NYSE: CHU; 0762.HK; 600050.SH) two networks, combined, perhaps, with lower incentives for Unicom to promote the CDMA network it will soon hand over to China Telecom (NYSE: CHA; 0728.HK), resulted in a major drop in new subscriptions for Unicom. Unicom added only 1.15 mln new subs (1.1 mln GSM subs - a 28% drop compared to its average during the first 4 months of 2008 - and only 55,000 CDMA subs - a staggering 81% lower than its average of 293,000 in the same 4-month period) to reach 169.7 mln (126.5 mln GSM subs and 43.2 mln CDMA subs). Of total new subs added in May, China Mobile took 87%, bringing its share of China's total mobile user base to 70.6%.
The threnody of fixed-mobile substitution continued for China's fixed-line operators, with China Telecom losing 820,000 fixed-line subs for a reduced total of 215.5 mln, and China Netcom (NYSE: CN; 0906.HK) waving goodbye to 390,000 fixed-line subs for a total of 108.4 mln.
Broadband, which saw slightly slower growth in April, rebounded in May. China Telecom added 700,000 new broadband users to reach 39.1 mln and Netcom added 530,000 to reach over 22.6 mln.
Keywords: mobile subscribers statistics 0728.HK 0762.HK 0906.HK 0941.HK 600050.SH CDMA CHA China Mobile China Netcom China Telecom China Unicom CHL CHU CN fixed-mobile substitution GSM restructuring telecom broadband subscribers fixed-line subscribers wireless
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