China's telecom operators vow to expand 4G services

BEIJING - China's top three telecom operators unveiled their plans on Tuesday to improve 4G services as part of the country's efforts to update its information infrastructure.

China Mobile, the largest mobile telecom provider in the country, aims to build at least 300,000 4G base stations nationwide, covering a population of 1.35 billion this year.

The company plans to add 200 million 4G users, bringing the total to 500 million.

China Unicom, another telecommunications heavyweight, will spend 75 billion yuan ($11.6 billion) to secure more 4G users. It also vows to lower service rates.

China Telecom, China's largest fixed-line service provider, is working to raise Internet connection speeds to at least 35 megabytes per second (Mbps) on average. One-third of its users will have access to rates between 50 and 100 Mbps.

China had an online population of 688 million at the end of 2015, about half of the country's total population, according to a report by the China Internet Network Information Center.

Another report released by the China Center for Information Industry Development showed that China has the world's largest population of mobile Internet users.

The value of the market was expected to exceed 2.3 trillion yuan ($362.2 billion) by the end of last year and should surpass 3 trillion yuan this year.