China’s 3G subscriber base passes 50 mn mark

China’s 3G subscribers have surpassed the 50 million mark – three years after networks first launched their commercial services. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) stated that it expects the numbers to increase to 150 million by the end of this year.
According to statistics from China Mobile, it had a total of 22.6 million 3G users in January, while China Unicom had 15.47 million and China Telecom attracted 13.64 million.
According to reports, now telecom carriers have a large number of subsidized 3G phones available to attract users, which will intensify the competition between China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom.
For historic comparison, at the end of May 2010, the country had 20 million 3G subscribers and 38.64 million by the end of October 2010.