July 25, Despite several rounds of negotiations with Apple Inc., China Mobile Ltd. (0941.HK, NYSE:CHL), the world’s largest mobile operator by subscribers, will not be in a position to offer the new iPhone when it is launched because the phone does not support China Mobile’s TD-SCDMA standard, caing.com reported, citing a person familiar with the matter.

China Mobile’s homegrown TD-SCDMA standard is incompatible with Apple’s next generation iPhone, but the new phone can work with China Unicom Ltd.’s (0762.HK, 600050.SH, NYSE:CHU) WCDMA 3G standard and the CDMA standard employed by China Telecom Corp. Ltd. (0728.HK, NYSE:CHA), the person said.

China Unicom and China Telecom, the country’s No. 2 and No. 3 mobile operators, will be authorized by Apple to sell its next generation phone in China, ending China Unicom’s monopoly on Apple phones in the country, the report said.

China Mobile probably won’t be able to offer the next generation iPhone until after it unveils its more advanced 4G LTE (long-term evolution) technology in late 2012 or early 2013, according to Reuters.

Apple finished the design for the new phone last October and is now in the final testing phase; the new product could be released to the market in China as early as the third quarter, according to the person.

“Apparently, the new generation iPhone product looks similar to the iPhone 4; only the cell phone’s camera has been upgraded to 8 megapixels from 5 megapixels on the iPhone 4,” the person was quoted as saying. “The relationship between the iPhone 4 and the next generation [phone] is kind of like the iPhone 3G and the iPhone 3GS.”

Source:21cbh