China Unicom has embarked on an aggressive marketing campaign in a bid to sign up 50 million new 3G subscribers this year, company sources have revealed.
The operator has launched campaigns in two of its branches as it seeks to attract new users with new services tailored to local communities staff told Marbridge Consulting,
Unicom is estimated to have signed up 14 million 3G users in 2010, adding an average of 1 million subscribers per month between May and November, however it will need to ramp that figure significantly to around 4 million per month to achieve the 50 million target, Marbridge notes.
Official figures from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology show the carrier had 11.6 million 3G subscribers at end-October, ranking it in second place behind China Mobile which had 16.9 million users at that point.
Unicom is also making five million low-cost 3G handsets available, after signing a central procurement deal late last week, local news sources state.
The phones include models from Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, LG, ZTE and Huawei.