Earlier, Chinese regulators have promised the country will provide 3G services during the 2008 Beijing Olympics. As 3G network deployment usually takes around 18 months, the industry has been widely anticipating that the government could award operators with the licences within months, probably in the first quarter of next year.

UBS in May predicted that 3G licensing could happen in the first half of next year. "The further delays" indicated in the updated UBS report suggests the guessing game will continue next year.

The crux to the delays of 3G licensing, in a large part, is that TD-SCDMA, a Chinese home-grown 3G standard is still being tested.

TD-SCDMA competes with WCDMA, which prevails in Europe, and CDMA 2000, which is popular in North America, Japan and the Republic of Korea. All three are international standards approved by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), an international organization within the United Nations co-ordinating the global telecom industry.

Source:佚名