China Telecom has ushered in the era of 4G competition in China with the launch of its TD-LTE network on Friday.
The operator announced that it will offer LTE in almost 100 Chinese cities during this initial phase of its 4G rollout.
China Telecom is offering 4G wireless broadband services for prices starting at 70 yuan ($11.50) for 1GB of domestic data, or 300-yuan for a six month plan with 6GB of data. Additional data charges will be 0.0003 yuan per kilobyte. The company has not yet launched 4G services for smartphones.
The launch comes weeks after China Mobile formally launched commercial 4G services following months of extensive TD-LTE “trials”. China's third mobile player, China Unicom, plans to launch services later this year.
But China Telecom and Unicom had been planning to rely on FDD LTE technology for their 4G networks, and were dealt a setback when the government awarded only TD-LTE spectrum and the associated licenses during the first phase of the 4G spectrum allocations.
The two operators are expected to use TD-LTE until FDD licenses are awarded some time this year.