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Technology Stocks : Qualcomm Moderated Thread - please read rules before posting -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: kech who wrote (6312)	1/19/2001 9:23:17 PM
From: DaYooper	Respond to of 196485

China Unicom Says It Will Lease Parent's CDMA Network by 2002 Hong Kong, Jan. 20 (Bloomberg) -- China Unicom Ltd. said it will lease a telephone network based on code division multiple access (CDMA) wireless technology from its parent, indicating China could provide the Qualcomm Inc.-developed system as soon as this year. ``We think China Unicom will lease the CDMA network in the last quarter of this year or earlier next year,'' Wang Jianzhou, China Unicom's president, told the Bloomberg Forum. Under the agreement, China United Telecommunications, China Unicom's parent, will pay for the construction of a CDMA network. China Unicom will then be responsible for operating and expanding it. Subscribers and revenue will belong to China Unicom. ``China Unicom will do the maintenance and marketing itself,'' Wang said. The agreement between China Unicom, the nation's No. 2 phone company, and its parent marks China's latest step towards adopting Qualcomm's CDMA wireless standard, which runs about 65 million cell phones worldwide. Wang said China Unicom also plans to buy the fixed assets of the network when it becomes ``mature.'' The price will be in accordance with the capital spent to build it, he said. Wang declined to confirm a Hong Kong Economic Times newspaper report yesterday that cited unidentified people as saying China Unicom will lease the mobile network for up to 1.67 billion yuan ($201 million) in leasing fees in the first two years. Earlier this month, China United Telecommunications took over an army-run network previously operated by Great Wall Telecom Co. which also utilized CDMA network technology. The army network acquisition gives it another 550,000 more customers on a network with capacity to grow to 750,000. To make the CDMA network more attractive to business customers, China United Telecommunications plans to add features such as a high-speed data transmission. ``China Unicom has the option to acquire the CDMA and the Great Wall networks once they become profitable,'' Wang said. China, with 65 million mobile subscribers, is expected to become the world's biggest cell-phone market within 10 years, moving ahead of the U.S. China Unicom had about 12.8 million subscribers as of the end of last year. Jan/19/2001 21:00 ET