China Telecom to sell high-end Motorola Android handset
Shanghai. December 30. INTERFAX-CHINA - China Telecommunications Corp. (China Telecom) will distribute its first Android handset, the Motorola XT800, China Telecom and Motorola Inc. announced on Dec. 29.
China Telecom will begin selling the XT800 on Jan. 4 for RMB 5,680 ($831.41). The phone will be targeted at high-end mobile phone users, Ma Daojie, general manager of China Telecom's eSurfing handset subsidiary, said during a press conference in Beijing on Dec. 29.
The XT800 is a dual-mode GSM/CDMA-EVDO handset that runs Google's Android operating system and supports both the WAPI and Wi-Fi Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) standards.
China Telecom and Motorola signed a strategic partnership agreement on Dec. 29 to distribute and market the XT800 and the other handsets that Motorola is developing for China Telecom.
China Telecom currently sells half of its handsets through its customer service centers and retail outlets, but it aims to increase its proportion of handset sales at third-party retailers to between 60 percent and 70 percent next year, Ma said.
Along with the XT800, Motorola has created two other handsets that run Android, the XT701, which will be sold by China United Network Co. Ltd. (China Unicom) and the MT710, which China Mobile Limited (China Mobile) launched on Dec. 4.
-HJL