- PHS Value-added Services
- 3G
PHS Value-added Services
Willcom will serve Chinese tourists in Japan, cooperating with Baidu
Willcom will team up with Baidu to offer a new service to Chinese tourists in Japan from November 2008. Based on the cooperation, Willcom will provide PHS terminals as well as shopping information to Chinese tourists. In order to serve Chinese customers conveniently, the two companies plan to set up a joint call center in Japan, with Chinese assistants replying to the call requests. Their cooperation will expand to jointly develop terminals and websites in the future.
Beijing Netcom provides 116114 portable contact list
Beijing Netcom launched ‘116114 Portable Contact List’ service on 1 August 2008. Through this service, PHS, fixed-line, and mobile customers can pre-store their contact list through Beijing Netcom’s webpage. Customers can dial 116114 and tell the assistant the name in the contact list they wish to call, and the assistant can either provide the telephone number or dial it directly to complete the call. Customers from any carrier are able to use the service. However, only China Netcom’s customers can post pay, while the subscribers from other carriers have to pay a half-year service fee in advance. To promote this new service, China Netcom provides a free trial from 1 August to 30 September 2008. After this, the service will be charged monthly.
Exhibit 1: Service Fee of 116114 Portable Contact List
| Monthly Fee (RMB/month) |
Maximum Contact Number |
| 5 |
50 |
| 10 |
100 |
| 20 |
300 |
| 30 |
500 |
| 50 |
1000 |
| 100 |
5000 |
| 200 |
10,000 |
Source: Beijing Netcom
3G
TD-SCDMA users reached 270,000 by 20 September
TD-SCDMA subscribers reached 270,000 by 20 September, driven by China Mobile’s second round of friendly user trials as well as the Beijing Olympic Games. However, only 38,000 were commercial trial users, representing 14.1% of the total TD-SCDMA users. As the partner of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games, China Mobile donated 90,000 terminals plus service packages to the Beijing Organizing Committee, Chinese team members and volunteers. In addition, there were 145,000 friendly trial users by 20 September.
Four new TD-SCDMA packages were unveiled by MIIT
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) unveiled China Mobile’s four optional TD-SCDMA tariff plans for four customer categories on 8 September, including young people, families, small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and large companies. Exhibit 1 shows the package for young people. In the other 3 packages, the local voice tariff is even lower. The local outgoing call charges are RMB 0.22 in first 3 minutes, RMB 0.11 per minute after that. All local incoming calls are free of charge. Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Tianjin will apply this new tariff first, from September 2008, and then these packages will be launched in all TD-SCDMA cities for a one year trial.
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