China Unicom to use cutting-edge tech for Winter Olympics

Virtual reality video streaming and facial recognition technologies will be used in the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, as China United Network Communications Group Co Ltd, the country's second-largest telecom carrier by mobile subscribers, scrambles to help build the event into a smart sports gathering enabled by cutting-edge communication technologies.

"As the official telecommunications service provider for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics, we will support the much-anticipated event with a secure, smart network that allows superfast internet speeds. We will also deploy pioneering applications to inject new vitality into the Olympic Games," said Wang Xiaochu, chairman of China Unicom, at a ceremony in Beijing on Friday.

The Beijing-based company hopes to leverage the 2022 Winter Olympics as another strategic opportunity to grow its business amid stiff competition from rivals such as China Mobile Communications Corp and China Telecommunications Corp.