Plan to grow broadband users

CHINA will boost the number of broadband family users by 30 percent, or 60 million, this year under a "Broadband China" project and also add over 100 million 3G phone users in 2013.

China will raise the high-speed FTTH (fiber-to-the-home) users by 35 million in 2013 from 94 million by the end of last year. It will also boost the normal home broadband user base by 25 million to 200 million by the end of this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said yesterday.

The increase is part of the "Broadband China" project which seeks to propel China's average broadband bandwidth capacity in urban regions to 20 megabytes per second by 2015, five to 10 times faster than the current level, the ministry said.

The project was unveiled in response to several consumer complaints about the low speed and high prices of previous family broadband services. In 2012, the average bandwidth cost dropped 30 percent annually, it said.

China, the world's No. 1 telecommunications market, will also add 100 million new 3G phone users this year from 232.8 million 3G users by the end of last year, the ministry said. By 2015, the ministry envisages China to have 450 million 3G users.

US-based Nielsen said by the end of last year the 66 percent penetration rate of smartphones in China has surpassed 53 percent of the United States and the UK's 51 percent but slightly behind South Korea's 67 percent.

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