(Yicai) March 22 — China Mobile, one of China’s three largest mobile network operators, will reduce its spending on fifth-generation wireless infrastructure this year compared to last year as the effects of new wireless standards begin to take effect. The plan is to reduce the amount by approximately 20%. Instead of requiring large investments.
The Beijing-based company said in an earnings conference yesterday that capital investment in 5G networks this year will amount to 69 billion yuan (US$9.55 billion) as the peak investment has passed and the profit period has begun. He announced that he was going up.
According to China Mobile, its net profit last year was RMB 131.8 billion (USD 18.2 billion), an increase of 5 percent from 2022, and sales increased by 8 percent to reach the RMB 1 trillion (USD 138.4 billion) mark for the first time. It is said that it has exceeded Annual report released on the same day.
Looking ahead, wireless carriers will likely spend more on computing power, capacity, and infrastructure this year, despite lower total capital spending. Last year, China Mobile spent 28.7 billion yuan on research and development, an increase of 59%, to create innovations in 5G, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things, cloud, big data and edge computing.
The company had 991 million users last year, of which 795 million were 5G users, an increase of 29% and more than four-fifths of the total.
One of the rising segments is its cloud business, whose revenue rose 66% to 83.3 billion yuan, and the company said its annual target is 150 billion yuan over the next three years.
Data consulting firm IDC said in a report that China Mobile Cloud’s market share in the public cloud field ranked fifth in the country in the third quarter of last year, rising by one slot. Revenue from the business increased 75 percent as Alibaba Cloud lost market share to Huawei Cloud, Tianyi Cloud, and China Mobile Cloud, dropping by about 6 percentage points.
Competition intensifies as Alibaba Cloud announced on February 29 that the e-commerce giant’s cloud arm will cut prices on its core products by an average of 20% and up to 55%.
China Mobile stock [SHA: 600941] Hong Kong-listed shares rose 1.5% to 104.22 yuan ($14) as of 2:11 p.m. [HKG: 0941] The stock rose 0.5% to HK$67.15 (US$9).
Editor: Emi Lane
