China recorded 1.21 billion mobile phone users by the end of September, with mobile phone penetration rate increasing 6.7% year-on-year to 89.2 sets per 100 people, according to data released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (report in Chinese).

The number of 3G subscribers soared 48.73 million in the third quarter of this year to 368 million, accounting for 30.5% of the total. TD users represent 60.2% of newly added 3G subscribers.

The number of fixed-line telephones dropped 7.75 million in the first three quarters to 270 million sets, accounting for 18.3% of the total phone users.

In the first three quarters of 2013, the revenue of telecom industry climbed 8.6% YOY to 870.9 billion yuan ($142.2 billion), while the turnover of e-commerce division surged 35% YOY to 7.5 trillion yuan (source in Chinese).

China planned to construct seven backbone network nodes in the cities of Chengdu, Wuhan, Xi’an, Shenyang, Nanjing, Chongqing, and Zhengzhou, according to the MIIT.

169 network and 163 network operated by China Unicom and China Telecom respectively are the two major backbone networks in China, accounting for over 80% of the Internet traffics in China. Currently, there are only three major network nodes in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou.

The construction of new backbone network nodes not only increases the data exchange efficiency, but also introduces Internet resources to the middle and western areas of China, according to Zhu Jun, vice director of Development Department under the MIIT.

image credit: Shutterstock.com

Emma Lee (Li Xin) was TechNode's e-commerce and new retail reporter until June 2022, when she moved to Sixth Tone to cover technology and consumption. Get in touch with her via lixin@sixthtone.com or Twitter.

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1 Comment

  1. These aren’t 7 new backbone networks – they’re 节点 – come on, that’s the name of your site.

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