China Telecom has chosen its system platform and set-top box manufacturers for IPTV expansions and upgrades by its provincial operating branches. The system platform vendors include ZTE, UTStarcom and Alcatel-Lucent. China Telecom also had envisioned a need for more than 530,000 standard-definition set-top boxes, and its vendors for those now include ZTE, UTStarcom, Coship, Motorola, Huawei, Postcom, Sunniwell, Alcatel-Lucent, Yuxing, 30 Kaitian and Changhong. Suppliers for about 38,000 high-definition set-top boxes include ZTE, UTStarcom, Alcatel-Lucent, Postcom and Changhong.
All of the suppliers are potential vendors from which the provincial branches can make their actual deployment choices. Those provincial units are not allowed to further negotiate pricing. China Telecom has around 1 million IPTV customers, and said a few months ago that it was looking arrange orders for as many as 574,000 set-top boxes.
For more:
- read this post [1] at IPTV News
Related articles:
China Telecom had been closing in on 1 million IPTV subs as of last May. China Telecom report [2]
China Telecom opened an IPTV lab in Shanghai last month. China Telecom report [3]
Links:
[1] http://www.iptv-news.com/content/view/2254/64/
[2] http://www.fierceiptv.com/story/china-telecom-moves-toward-1-million-iptv-customers/2008-06-30
[3] http://www.fierceiptv.com/story/china-telecom-opens-shanghai-iptv-lab/2008-07-08