China Unicom is expected to see a substantial saving in capital expenditure because of a reduction in equipment costs, according to company officials.
'The prices of mobile equipment have been falling substantially in the past year,' said Wang Jianzhou, president and executive director of the company.
'The capital expenditure per subscriber has dropped 40 per cent since June last year.'
A faster than expected subscriber growth rate has contributed to the fall in per subscriber capital expenditure, according to China Unicom, the Hong Kong-listed vehicle of China United Telecommunications, the mainland's second-largest telecommunications operator.
The company has added about 700,000 mobile subscribers in the past two months, giving it a total of nine million subscribers at August 31.
China Unicom has budgeted 43.8 billion yuan (about HK$40.9 billion) for capital expenditure this year to expand and upgrade its telecommunications networks.
Only 12.5 billion yuan had been paid at the end of August, executive vice-president Shi Cuiming said.
