China's mobile phone users sent 195.89 billion short messages in the first 11 months this year, according to figures released by the Ministry of Information Industry Tuesday.

The number of mobile phone subscribers in China reached a record 329 million at the end of November, said the ministry in its press release. This is a rise of 59.97 million over the end of last year. There are 24.8 mobile phones for every one hundred Chinese, the ministry said.

Though facing heated competition brought by mobile communications, the number of fixed-line subscribers rose 50.41 million over the end of last year to 313 million at the end of November. There are 24.5 fixed-line subscribers for every one hundred Chinese, the ministry said.

Statistics from the ministry show the total number of telephone users in China, both mobile phone and fixed-line users, reached 640 million at the end of November.

The ministry also said that in the first 11 months of the year China's total revenue of post and telecommunications reached 525.17 billion yuan (63.5 billion US dollars), up 12 percent over the same period last year.

Postal revenue was 49.67 billion yuan (6 billion US dollars), arise of 1.6 percent year-on-year, and the revenue of telecommunications hit 475.5 billion yuan (about 57.5 billion US dollars), up 13.2 percent year-on-year. Fixed assets investment in telecommunications reached 176.5 billion yuan (21.3 billion US dollars) by the end of November, up 4.6 percent year-on-year.

China's mobile phone users outnumbered fixed-line phone subscribers in October 2003. China imported its first mobile phone telecommunication facilities in 1987, and it took a decade for its number of subscribers to jump to 10 million.

Four years later, the country had the most mobile phone subscribers in the world.

(Xinhua News Agency December 23, 2004)