Nokia, the world's largest cellphone maker, is beefing up its efforts to tap into China's CDMA mobile phone market where the Finnish firm is a new entrant.

Nokia aims to become one of the top three vendors in China's CDMA mobile phone market in the near future, said Timo Ihamuotila, senior vice-president of Nokia's CDMA business unit.

He would not specify a timetable for the goal.

"We are progressing as planned towards that goal," he said. "I hope we can reach it as soon as possible."

Ihamuotila forecast the global CDMA handset market will grow 10-15 per cent year-on-year this year.

And the CDMA mobile phone market will grow "as fast as the overall market until 2009," the vice-president said.

He said that "China's CDMA mobile phone market is not growing as fast as we had expected," but is still creating a big business opportunity for Nokia.

Globally, unit sales of Nokia's mobile phones are almost twice those of its closest rival, Motorola. The firm lagged behind Motorola in China for a long time until January 2004, when Nokia grabbed the crown from the US firm.

Yet, Nokia has a long way to go in China's CDMA mobile phone market; it was given a licence to make and sell CDMA phones in June 2003.

Ihamuotila said Nokia is playing a rapid catch-up with top players in China's CDMA handset market by aggressively introducing new models to the country.

Motorola, Samsung and LG are the top three CDMA handset vendors in China.

Nokia launched one CDMA model in 2003 and increased that number to three last year.

In 2005, Nokia plans to introduce six CDMA phone models in China, including one tailored for China Unicom, the CDMA network operator.

Ihamuotila also said Nokia is in talks with China Unicom for further cooperation, but he would not go into detail.

Nokia will increase research and development (R&D) activities on CDMA in China, he noted.

However, the growth of the Chinese CDMA market will be affected by several factors such as 3G licensing and looming industry restructuring.

China Unicom has seen the growth of its CDMA subscription base slowing down in recent months.

"The biggest challenge is the growth of the overall CDMA market," Ihamuotila said.

"Only when the market grows can all the specific software features be justified."

China Unicom is now phasing out handset subsidies to boost its CDMA service.

Ihamuotila said that move will also boost Nokia's CDMA mobile phone business.

"The CDMA handset market will become more open with the canceling of the subsidy scheme," he said.

(China Daily July 6, 2005)