| China Telecom's 2M Quarter |
| Written by Dave Burstein |
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China Mobile is beginning FTTB in Jiangsu through its newly acquired China Tietong subsidiary. Lynn Hutcheson of Ovum reports estimates of 13M to 19M new fiber subscribers in 2009, adding to the 6M end of 2008. Those numbers means they will surpass Japan (currently, 17.5M) and become the world leader within 18 months. In the reorganization, Mobile has added Tietong as their landline division, and will move rapidly towards quad play. China Mobile has nearly unlimited access to financing. They are highly profitable and the government-owned banks will provide whatever additional they ask. Chairman Wang Jianzhou told Reuters they are loking for companies to acquire, while adding fiber and IPTV is another natural growth path. China Telecom is already among the world leaders, with about 4M lines according to Hutcheson. He believes most of what's going in will be fiber to the basement, although there are rumors around that CT has tenders for 4M GEPON lines and more, "We are no longer a telephone-lines company," with the new 3G licenses and very ambitious triple and quadplay plans. Back in DSL,China Netcom did 345K in October, 234K in November, and apparently -22K in December after the merger with China Unicom. Given the small change at China Telecom, I'd guess the December figure is purely an artifact of the merger. China of course has not been spared economic issues. Premier Wen Jiabao describes the employment situation this year as "grave." That makes the growth even more impressive. |
With China Mobile threatening with Fiber to the Basement, China Telecom added 2.1M DSL subscribers between October and December. That is slightly above their typical quarterly pace, and a remarkable achievement as the Chinese economy starts to slow. They are advancing IP TV and will soon be bundling DSL + Wireless.
