China Telecom, CMMB venture to deploy advanced network for ‘connected car’ services

Commercial deployment of multimedia broadcasting platform next year after nationwide trials in 2017

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Global Vision has formed strategic alliances with seven major domestic suppliers of car-mounted mobile terminal electronic devices. Photo: Edward Wong

Published: 8:45pm, 7 Feb 2017Updated: 10:39pm, 7 Feb 2017

China Telecom, the world’s eighth largest wireless network operator by subscribers, has agreed to collaborate with Global Vision Media Technology on rolling out key infrastructure that will support nationwide, satellite-based “connected car” services.

Global Vision Media is a joint venture between Hong Kong-listed CMMB Vision Holdings and Global Broadcasting Media Group, a subsidiary of the state-owned China Radio International.

“Under the agreement, China Telecom will render its terrestrial 3G and 4G mobile network to combine with the company’s L-band satellite broadcasting network to develop a convergent mobile delivery network,” CMMB Vision chairman and chief executive Charles Wong Chau-chi said in a regulatory filing on Tuesday.

The cooperation with China Telecom, which had 215 million mobile subscribers at the end of December, marks CMMB Vision’s latest effort to step up the commercial deployment of a new “multimedia broadcasting service platform”, capable of bundling high-quality video, audio and internet data services, as well as precision navigation, to hundreds of millions of potential subscribers in the world’s biggest car market by sales.

That platform will be made possible by the mainland-developed multicast technology known as Converged Mobile Multimedia Broadcasting, which CMMB Vision has long been promoting. The Global Vision venture serves as the company’s operating arm.

CMMB Vision plans to deploy a nationwide trial network for its multimedia broadcasting platform this year, paving the way for commercial deployment next year.