SAN DIEGO-China United Telecommunications Corp. and Qualcomm Inc. announced an agreement outlining guidelines for Chinese manufacturers to license Qualcomm’s intellectual property to manufacture and sell Code Division Multiple Access wireless equipment.
The deal stipulates that Chinese manufacturers that enter into such licenses with Qualcomm will purchase their requirement of CDMA Application Specific Integrated Circuits from Qualcomm as long as prices are competitive.
China Unicom was designated by the Chinese government to negotiate this framework agreement with Qualcomm.
“This agreement enables China Unicom to move forward aggressively with plans to deploy a commercial CDMA network with an initial capacity of 10 million subscribers this year, and exponentially grow the network in the next few years,” said Yang Xianzu, chairman and general manager of China Unicom. “Our agreement with Qualcomm will accelerate and simplify the CDMA licensing process for Chinese manufacturers, and Chinese consumers will be offered the advantages of CDMA.”
The installation of CDMA equipment in China Unicom’s wireless network is expected to begin immediately.
Nearly all wireless phones in China use Global System for Mobile communications technology. Last February, the Chinese government agreed to allow an operator to build a CDMA network but backed out of the negotiations in December saying China Unicom could negotiate on its behalf.
