The head of China’s Ministry of Information Industry has outlined sweeping changes to the telecoms industry that will centre around four operators, each with licences to provide fixed-line and mobile services. Wu Jichuan told China Daily that the restructuring, designed to promote competition, would take at least two years to carry out. The four carriers were later confirmed by a ministry spokesman to be the cellular companies China Mobile and China Unicom, along with fixed-line operator China Telecom and China Netcom.
“With four integrated service providers, the market will become fully competitive, and customers will be able to enjoy high quality services at reasonable prices,” said Wu.