中國電信寄望4G促增長

China Telecom is looking to the rollout of fast-speed 4G services in China for future growth, as the domestic telecoms market becomes saturated even in the world's most populous country.

中國電信(China Telecom)期望它即將在中國推出的高速4G網絡服務能促進公司未來增長。在這個全球人口最多的國家，電信市場已趨飽和。

China Telecom, one of the largest telecom groups in China, ended 2014 with 186m mobile subscribers, but reported a net increase of only 40,000 subscribers year-on-year. Sales and profit growth was also slim: net income rose 0.8 per cent year-on-year to Rmb17.7bn on revenues of Rmb324.4bn, up 0.9 per cent year-on-year and missing analysts' estimates.

中國電信是中國最大電信集團之一，2014年底擁有移動用戶1.86億，但僅同比增長4萬人。銷售額和盈利增速也顯得乏力：淨利潤同比增長0.8%至177億元人民幣，收入同比增長0.9%至3244億元人民幣，不及分析師預期。

Chairman and chief executive Wang Xiaochu said on Wednesday he expects intensifying market competition to gradually lead to an era of competition for existing customers:

中國電信董事長兼首席執行官王曉初週三表示，日益加劇的市場競爭預計將帶來一個爭奪現有客戶的時代。

At present, China's economy has entered into the "new normal" of medium-high-level growth, and innovation will be the key driver for future development. The booming development of the "Consumption Internet" market along with the emerging "Industrial Internet" market in China will provide us with vast market potential.

他說：“中國經濟已進入一種中高水平增長的‘新常態’，創新將成爲未來發展的主要推動力。‘消費互聯網’市場的蓬勃發展以及中國新興的‘產業互聯網’市場將爲我們提供巨大的市場潛力。”

Looking ahead, we have full confidence. We will seize the crucial opportunities from the issuance of 4G licence and the sharing of tower resources. We will increase our investment and promote the rapid development of our mobile services in full strengths, especially the profitable scale development of our 4G services.

“展望未來，我們充滿信心。我們將抓住發放4G牌照以及共享鐵塔資源的重要契機。我們將擴大我們的投資並全速推動我們移動服務的快速發展，特別是可盈利的4G服務的規模化發展。”