Marbridge Daily

MIIT Announces February 2013 Telecom Statistics

MIIT, 3/21/13

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has released its January-February 2013 telecom industry statistics. The figures for the two months of January and February were as follows:

Telecom operating revenues for the first two months of 2013 were RMB 201.25 bln (USD 32.30 bln), up 9.8% YoY, among which, core services revenue was RMB 173.79 bln (USD 27.90 bln), up 8.2% YoY. Among these figures, mobile telecom revenue was RMB 126.4 bln, up 9.8% YoY, fixed line telecom revenue was RMB 47.35 bln, up 4.0% YoY, and broadband revenue was RMB 20.5 bln, up 8.1% YoY.

Among telecom revenue, non-voice revenue was RMB 93.67 bln, up 15.8% YoY and accounting for 53.9% of revenue, as compared to 50.3% in the first two months of 2012. Voice revenue was 80.12 bln, up 0.4% YoY, among which mobile voice revenue was RMB 70.82 bln, up 2.0% YoY. Fixed-line voice revenue was RMB 9.30 bln, down 10.2% YoY.

Among fixed-line telecom revenue, non-voice revenue accounted for 80.4% of total fixed-line revenue. Among non-voice revenue, fixed-line data and internet revenue and Internet value-added service (IVAS) revenue grew 8.1% and 10.6% YoY, respectively. Local and long distance call revenue fell 9.4% and 12.2% YoY during the period. IPTV revenue grew 51.5% YoY but only accounted for 1.34% of total IVAS revenue.

Among mobile telecom revenue, non-voice revenue accounted for 44.0% of all revenue. Mobile data and internet revenue was RMB 24.82 bln, up 53.8% YoY. Wireless value-added service (WVAS) revenue was 29.35 bln, up 4.8% YoY.

Mobile voice revenue declined 4.3% during the first two months of the year. Mobile voice ARPU was RMB 31.1, down from 33.8 a year before. Mobile data and internet revenue increased 29.5% YoY, owing to the growth of 3G services. Mobile data and internet ARPU was RMB 11.3, up from RMB 8.1 a year before. Comprehensive mobile ARPU was RMB 56.

Total telephone subscribers saw a net increase of 9.04 mln in February to reach 1.409 bln. Mobile subscribers grew by 9.93 mln to 1.132 bln, while fixed-line subscribers decreased by 885,000 to 277.32 mln. Broken down by traditional fixed-line and PHS, the traditional (i.e. non-PHS) fixed-line subscriber base declined by 758,000 to 265.55 mln, while the PHS subscriber base decreased by 127,000 subs to 11.78 mln. In February, 14.04 mln new 3G subscribers were added to reach a total 3G user base of 259.92 mln. China added 9.32 mln new TD-SCDMA mobile subs in February alone, bringing total TD-SCDMA subs to 104.18 mln, up 84.1% YoY, and accounting for 40.1% of all 3G users.

A total of 157.61 bln SMS messages were sent from January to February, a 0.7% increase YoY, owning to the large amount of "public welfare" SMS messages sent from organizations to large groups of people during the Chinese New Year holiday in February, but slowing in rate of growth due to the popularization of mobile chat and microblogging services. Peer to peer SMSs decreased 10.6% during the two-month period. Again due to the growth of Tencent's (0700.HK) WeChat (Weixin) mobile messaging application and Sina's (Nasdaq: SINA) Weibo microblogging platform, SMS news package subscriptions decreased 18.5% during the two-month period. 14.65 bln MMSs were sent during the period, down 38.4% YoY.

In terms of Internet access, China added 1.54 mln new broadband subs in February to reach a total of 178.91 mln. 2M and higher broadband subscriptions now total 178.907 mln, and account for 95% of all broadband subs. 4M and higher broadband subs have reached 122.212 mln and account for 68.3% of all broadband subs. China added 2.44 mln 8M and over broadband subs during January-February 2013, bringing the total number of 8M and over broadband subs to 29.39 mln. Dial-up internet subs declined by 20,000 during the period, reducing the total dial-up user base to 5.72 mln. Mobile Internet subscribers grew by 16.07 mln in February to reach a total of 803.45 mln. Among mobile internet users, 774.62, or 96.4%, were mobile handset users, down from 97.7% in the year-ago period. Data card users reached 15.86 mln during the two month period, up 3.5% YoY.

China's Three Telecom Operators' Market Share by Revenue

Keywords: national statistics PHS subscribers China Telecom China Mobile China Unicom ARPU IPTV mobile data broadband revenue telecom wireless WVAS MIIT market share mobile subscribers SMS 3G dial-up fixed-line subscribers IVAS TD-SCDMA 0700.HK mobile Internet telephone subscribers broadband subscribers long-distance 0728.HK 0762.HK 600050.SH CHA CHU CHL 0941.HK