China Telecom, the mainland's biggest fixed-line phone company, said it would be able to offer third-generation (3G) services seven or eight months after it gets a licence, based on trials of home-grown 3G standard TD-SCDMA.

China Telecom has so far built 70 stations to undergo TD-SCDMA tests in Baoding of North China's Hebei Province.

"The construction of the remaining 30 stations there will be finished at the end of this month," Chairman Wang Xiaochu told reporters after the company's annual general meeting in Hong Kong yesterday. "We will then start our TD-SCDMA trial-run at 100 stations and the final test results should come out soon."

As for which standard the mainland would adopt, Wang said: "Choosing TD-SCDMA or other 3G standards (in China) should depend on which one of them is more acceptable to local consumers."

TD-SCDMA is a home-grown 3G standard that Beijing said it would adopt to build its national 3G network.

China Telecom's booth at China Elecomm 2006 which opened on May 23 at Shanghai Everbright Exhibition Centre. [newsphoto]

China Telecom and the mainland's two major mobile phone operators  China Mobile and China Unicom  have been authorized to conduct a TD-SCDMA trial-run on the mainland.

"There are only two mobile operators on the mainland  it's too few," said Wang, who felt confident China Telecom will be in the first batch of 3G licence-holders.

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