Chinese telecom operators have been spending heavily in the first three quarters to expand the rural markets.

Statistics with the Ministry of Information Industry (MII) show that the fixed assets investment in telecom sector rose 17.7 percent year-on-year to 142.48 billion yuan in the first ten months, against 12.3 percent drop last year in the same period.

Analysts predicted that the whole year's figure may be around 15 percent, beyond the expected goal of 10 percent.

That means the strongest growth of fixed assets investment in telecom sector since 2001 and the new round of investment has started, said analysts.

Si Xianxiu, researcher with the Academy of Telecommunications under the MII, attributed the sharp rise in investment to the growth of rural programs promoted by the government.

Fiscal report from China Mobile shows that the company planned to invest 83.3 billion yuan this year mainly in GSM network, support system and transmission. The figure is much higher than last year's investment of 71.5 billion yuan.

ZTE, one of China's major telecom equipment providers, gained 50percent rise in sales of wireless products in the third quarter, which is mainly brought by the GSM network expansion in rural areas.

It has nothing to do with 3G license or IPTV, said Si, adding that large-scale investment in 3G would start until the licenses are issued.

Wang Jianzhou, general manager of China Mobile, said that China Mobile spent nine billion yuan providing mobile services to 26,000 remote villages last year. The senior executive said that half of China's Mobile's new subscribers every month came from the rural areas. (US$1= 7.87 yuan)

(Xinhua News Agency November 15, 2006)