Online firms clicking for mobile users
Mainland web companies seek to cash in on the increasing use of smartphones but analysts say it will be a while before they can make money
Nearly half of the urban residents on the mainland own smartphones and 60 per cent of them would give up their television sets rather than their phones, a report says.
The report, "Our Mobile Planet: China", conduced by Google and research firm IPSOS, said 69 per cent of the respondents said they accessed the internet every day on their smartphones and 38 per cent said they never left home without their phones.
Beijing has said the licence for high-speed 4G networks will be issued by the end of the year. Meanwhile, the improvement in telecommunications infrastructure together with new gadgets launched every other day are expected to encourage users to spend more time on mobile devices in the future.
"There is no doubt that traditional internet operations must have mobile platforms in the future," said industry observer Xiang Ligang.
But Xiang said the question was how soon could mobile business really generate income. "I think it will still take a long while."
Even the most successful product in the mobile era, WeChat, developed by internet giant Tencent, has only just taken its first step to cash in on its user base. The popular social-networking application launched the latest version in August with several payment services.