Mobile phone subscribers hit 388 mln in Nov. (Xinhua) Updated: 2005-12-27 09:32
The number of mobile phone subscribers in China reached a record 388 million
at the end of November, said the Ministry of Information Industry (MII) on
Monday.
This is an increase of 53.3 million over the end of last year. The number of
new mobile phone subscribers in China grew by an average 4.84 million per month
in the first 11 months of the year,said the ministry in a press release. At the
end of November, there were 29.1 mobile phones for every 100 Chinese.
Along with the increase in mobile phone subscribers, short message volume
climbed 40.1 percent year-on-year. More than 274.3 billion text messages were
sent in the first 11 months, said the ministry.
Despite fierce competition from mobile operators, the number offixed-line
subscribers rose by more than 39 million on last year'sfigure to a total of 350
million by the end of November. By then, there were 26.6 fixed-line subscribers
for every one hundred Chinese, the ministry said.
Statistics from the ministry show the total number of telephoneusers in
China, including both mobile phone users and fixed-line users, reached 738
million by the end of November. China's mobile phone users outnumbered
fixed-line phone subscribers in October 2003.
The ministry also said in the first 11 months this year China'stotal post and
telecommunications revenue reached 581.75 billion yuan, up 11.2 percent over the
same period last year.
China imported its first mobile phone telecom facilities in 1987, and it took
a decade for the number of subscribers to reach 10 million. Four years later,
the country had the largest number of mobile phone subscribers in the
world.
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