China Unicom's code division multiple access (CDMA) business is showing a turnaround according to the latest statistics, while the country's broader telecommunications sector is deteriorating.
The SAR-listed arm of the country's No 2 mobile carrier said it added 1.34 million new subscribers last month to reach 35.4 million, a 16 per cent improvement from June's 1.16 million.
During the first seven months, Unicom added an average 1.19 million users a month.
Strong CDMA growth and stable GSM (global system for mobile communications) take-up contributed to last month's surprising figures, according to SG Securities research director Charle Peza.
Last month, Unicom added 322,000 more CDMA users to bring its total CDMA subscriber base to 1.26 million. Monthly growth rate more than doubled from June's 151,000 new users.
'This performance is surprisingly good, given the China-wide cellular market net [subscriber] addition slowdown. Importantly, CDMA does not yet appear to be eating into GSM growth,' he said.
In the broader market, the mainland added 4.15 million mobile users last month to reach 180.32 million, an 11.7 per cent drop from June's net addition of 4.7 million users, the Ministry of Information Industry said.
