Last week, I attended the UBS Greater China Conference in Shanghai. UBS does a nice job keeping this conference focused and intelligent. Ymer hasn’t touched too much on the status of 3G in China, but given the fact that all “big four telcos” (China Telecom / Netcom / Mobile / Unicom), as well as Huawei, Datang Mobile, and Spreadtrum were at the conference, perhaps this is a chance to reveal what was reported (nothing overly dramatic, mind you, hold onto your hats):

(1) Most agree China will issue 3G licenses this year — likely in 2H06.

(2) Most companies are expecting three licenses, which means some restructuring is needed among the Chinese telcos — this is old news, though.

(3) Maturity of TD-SCDMA is the biggest bottleneck today — again, the market assumed this was the case for sometime — the government’s licensing decision will largely be dependent on the maturity of this technology. The next stage of TD-SCDMA trials is critical in raising overall confidence in this technology which is expected to be completed at the end of 1Q06.

The upside — the fact that my Dopod 818pro isn’t 3G compatible won’t be an issue for at least another year…