China's top three telecommunication operators, China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom, invested 80 billion yuan to boost the third-generation (3G) network so far this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said Wednesday.

China Mobile, the leading mobile network operator, has opened 3G service in 38 companies based on the domestically-developed TD-SCDMA 3G standard, and is expected to expand the service to 238 cities by the end of this year.

China Telecom has also offered 3G service using the US-developed CDMA2000 standard in 342 cities, while China Unicom has expanded its network based on Europe's WCDMA standards to 100 cities.

The top three operators have started trial 3G operation, which allows mobile phone users to download data faster, make video calls and watch TV shows.

The ministry expected the three operators would invest 170 billion yuan (24.87 billion U.S dollars) in 3G network construction this year.

(Xinhua News Agency July 23, 2009)