The company has been considering possible partners among foreign telecom operators ever since its public listing last June. However, no substantial negotiations have been held for that purpose, nor is there any timetable for them, Tan Xinghui, vice-president of the company, said yesterday at a Lunar New Year celebration luncheon.

He declined to name possible candidates or to confirm the names of potential partners listed in a newspaper report.

However, he said telecom equipment vendors will not be considered for such a strategic partnership to avoid obligatory purchases from those companies, Tan said.

China Unicom's only strategic investor, Hong Kong conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa, bought US$400 million worth of shares when the company went public, as part of a broader co-operation agreement with China Unicom's parent company.

"One strategic partner is not enough; we still have new investment demand coming," Tan said.

Part of the investment would be to acquire mobile networks in 19 provincial-level regions from its parent company, Tan said.

China Unicom will also be able to gain expertise from its strategic partners, Tan said, adding that both parties will be able to increase the market value through the partnership.

The number of mobile phone subscribers on the mainland is expected to increase to 100 million by 2005, making the mainland the largest mobile market in the world.

The Asian Wall Street Journal said yesterday that China Unicom is considering selling a minority stake in it to one of several foreign companies, including NTT DoCoMo Inc, Deutsche Telekom AG and AT&T Wireless Group.

"They are just some of the companies we are considering," Tan said.

On the year's prospect, Shi Cuiming, China Unicom executive vice-president, said the company should be able to increase its mobile phone subscribers at least by the same number as last year.

On November 30, the company had about 12 million subscribers, compared with 4 million at the end of 1999, he said.

Its market share had grown to 22 per cent on November 30 from 14.4 per cent at the end of 1999. China Unicom won more than 30 per cent of all new subscribers on the mainland last year, Shi said.

On the China Netcom Corp's Internet protocol (IP) phone rate, which was cut earlier this month, Tan said China Unicom has been considering a similar move, but will wait to see the effect of Netcom's rate cut on the market.

Netcom, one of the four companies which have licences for IP telephony, cut its rates by more than 50 per cent earlier this month after telecom price regulations were relaxed earlier.

(China Daily 01/18/2001)