BEIJING—In July, China became the world’s biggest mobile-phone market. The country’s Ministry of Information Industry (MII) announced the country had 120.6 million mobile phone subscribers at the end of July, about half a million more than in the United States.
China added 3.8 million new mobile-phone subscribers in July, in addition to 2.4 million fixed-line subscribers, which totaled 166.8 million. At the current rate of increase, the number of mobile users will overtake the number of fixed-line subscribers in 2004.
The penetration rate of mobile phones in China is around 10 percent, still low compared with percentages of approximately 50 percent in Europe and 40 percent in the United States. Mobile-phone manufacturers still see China as a promising market.
Jan Malm, president of Ericsson (China) told the China Daily, “The Chinese market is a shining star in the cloud of global economic downturn.”
China overtakes U.S. in number of mobile phone subscribers
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