The once-postponed mobile phone reading service of China Telecom will now reportedly be formally launched in late July 2010.
An insider revealed to the local media that the related departments of China Telecom have started planning and deploying resources for the launch of this new service and the company will set up a mobile reading base in Zhejiang at the same time. By then, China Telecom will sign a strategic agreement with the General Administration of Press and Publication of China for its development in the Chinese digital publishing and e-book sector.
Prior to this, China Telecom announced plans to launch the mobile reading service on April 30, 2010, but the plan was postponed due to the incompleteness of various parts of its plan.
In the second half of 2009, another Chinese telecom operator China Mobile set up a mobile reading base in Zhejiang and other participants in this project included ASPire Technologies, Huawei, and Shanda. ASPire Technologies is responsible for the operation and management of the project, Huawei provides technology support, and Shanda is the major provider of contents for the mobile reading service. In addition, China Unicom is planning to establish a similar site in Guangdong.
Statistics from local media show the scale of the Chinese mobile phone reading market will reach CNY4.6 billion in 2010 and it will be over CNY10 billion by 2013.
