As China's three major telecom operators have all launched 3G services, adjustments of industrial structure are expected to happen in the sector. Experts say the dominance of China Mobile in the 2G era won't be the case in the third generation.
Xiamen is among the first batch of Chinese cities to establish a TD-SCDMA trial network. Xiamen Mobile, China Mobile's Xiamen branch, has invested nearly 800 million yuan in the development of its TD-network. So far, it has set up more than 1,100 mobile base stations. This makes Xiamen the first city in China to extend 3G services citywide.
But China Mobile's momentum in Xiamen hasn't carried across the rest of the country. Many subscribers in the remaining first batch of cities are holding back for 3G service subscription.
One Beijing citizen said "I will wait about half a year to see how the service is like based on other users' comments."
Experts say the wait-and-see attitude provides opportunities for China Telecom and China Unicom to attract more 3G service users. These two smaller rivals have more mature 3G technologies. And they're probably able to offer better 3G services than China Mobile. This is expected to result in reshuffle of the country's telecom sector.
