The issuing of China's third generation (3G) of wireless telecommunications mobile licenses will be based on the market, according to Information Industry Vice-Minister Lou Qinjian.

At the same time, Chinese telecom operators will be allowed to choose 3G standards in line with their development strategies, he said Tuesday at the ongoing 3G Mobile International Summit China in Beijing.

"They can choose the 3G standards from among the three recognized ones," he said, without saying when 3G licenses will be released.

The three are the European WCDMA (wideband code division multiple access), US CDMA 2000 and the locally developed TD-SCDMA (time division synchronous code division multiple access) standards.

He also dispelled rumors that China has set a date to roll out 3G licenses later this year or early next year.

"We are to learn from the experiences in European and Asian countries while releasing licenses," he said.

Lou pointed out that the market as well as the maturity of technologies are key factors to determine the timing for issuing 3G licensing in China.

Being one of the world's largest telecom markets, issuing of 3G licenses in China has become a very sensitive nerve that tickles the world's major telecom operators and equipment suppliers and makers, which are expected to touch off a round of billions of dollars in spending on new telecom equipment.

Nevertheless, China remains cautious about the issue of 3G licenses despite the increasing outcry from telecom operators and equipment providers.

"The release of 3G licenses should be based on maturity of the technology and market," Information Industry Minister Wang Xudong said on May 17, indicating the Chinese Government is not in a hurry to release 3G mobile licenses.

According to Wang, MII is closely following network trial testing for the three 3G standards.

"The trial testing is going on smoothly," said MII's Science and Technology Department Director Wen Ku Tuesday at the summit.

"Problems such as inter-operability between terminals are still acute issues to be addressed during the testing," he said.

The testing which mainly involves the telecom operators started in October last year and ends in September this year.

The result of the trial is to provide a point of reference to China's 3G industry policies and strategies.

In an earlier interview, Lou said that the ministry is currently teaming up with the State Development and Reform Commission (SDRC) to do research work on related policies.

According to current market expectations, China Mobile, the world's biggest carrier in terms of subscribers, will build a 3G system on the WCDMA standard, which is based on the GSM technology popular in Europe.

China Unicom will apparently build a system based on the CDMA 2000 standard developed by Qualcomm Inc of the United States.

As for the domestically produced TD-SCDMA system, all six domestic telecom operators are doing network trial tests based on the system.

Insiders also expected both the major fixed-line operators - China Telecom and China Netcom - will get licenses, as will the two existing mobile operators, China Mobile and China Unicom.

(China Daily June 2, 2004)