China's new 3G cellular standard finally upgraded

After a lengthy delay, China has finally approved its 3G standards for cellular service reports the Mercury News. China has 35 million cellphone users and a has a huge potential for new markets. The government said it would begin to grant licenses in the middle of 2006.  Officials have been working hard to development its 3G standard TD-SCDMA, one of the three international 3G standards. The other two are WCDMA in Europe and CDMA2000 in the United States.

"China has been able to produce the desired result of the TD-SCDMA standard in a short time,'' said a Ministry of Information Industry official, quoted by the People's Daily. "Compared with Europe and the United States, we are relatively late in creating our standard and our investment is far smaller,'' said the unnamed official

Maturity and intellectual property negotiations are considered key factors in China's 3G development. Most profits in China's telecom market flow into the overseas giants due to China's lack of patents in the current technology, which is considered the crucial reason for Beijing to push TD-SCDMA.