China's statistic on 4G users continues to rise and is likely to reach a 250-million mark before 2016. (Photo : Reuters)
The country's 4G users will reach 250 million before the year 2016, as remarked by an official from China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).
Wen Ku, an MIIT official in charge of telecommunications, said that the forecast follows the recently released data from MIIT.
For 2015's first quarter, China added approximately 60 million 4G users, according to the report. Forty percent of the first-quarter figure subscribed to the technology only in March.
In Dec. 2014, the number of 4G subscribers stood at 90 million--a whopping figure following the MIIT's licensing to China Unicom, China Mobile and China Telecom to operate 4G services just a year ago.
The official data also showed that as 4G users continued to increase, future charges for telecom service might go down.
In recent years, telecom charges have been declining in the country. However, Wen said that the statistic is yet to reach a mark "satisfying to clients," citing the still inadequate supply of the market.
The MIIT official also said that investment in the 4G segment still has a big room for cost cutting. As well, full returns are yet to be made.
Meanwhile, the data also showed that mobile broadband users reached a 640-million mark as of this year's first quarter. On the other hand, wired broadband users increased from 4.2 percent year on year.
Mobile phone subscriptions in China have also increased by 3.6 percent year on year, reaching 1.29 billion by the end of March.
The MIIT data reported that the 4G segment's aggregate market capitalization has already reached a 4-trillion-yuan mark.
China has a total of 74 listed Internet companies.
