Telecom To Spend RMB 5B On Equipment, Seeks Nokia's Advice

China Telecom plans to spend RMB 5 billion on a new round of CDMA network construction bidding for approximately 30,000 base stations for 219 local networks nationwide in late 2008 or early 2009. China Telecom granted Huawei, Alcatel-Lucent, Motorola, Nortel Networks and ZTE 30%, 20%, 18%, 17% and 15%, respectively, of contracts in its first round of CDMA bidding for 81 city networks.

China Telecom is negotiating with terminal manufacturers including Nokia to improve the production and sale of CDMA handsets. Telecom has altered purchasing regulations to require provincial subsidiaries to get approval for large CDMA handset purchases.

Lisa