Chairman S.J. Lu of Taiwan`s Chunghwa Telecom Co., Ltd. recently said the company will open a branch in mainland China this year to offer content-application services and the project will be finalized by June.

The pledge is linked to Lu`s statement made early this year that the company had planned to offer distribution channel and value-added services in the mainland.

Taiwan`s No.1 telecom firm moved to launch investments in mainland China immediately after Taiwan government permitted the island`s telecom providers early this year to run Type II telecom services in the mainland.

The company`s investment arm, Chunghwa Investment Co., Ltd., has opened a joint venture with the Xiamen government to offer call-center services.

Lu said the mainland poses lucrative business opportunities to Taiwan`s telecom providers as the mainland is still behind Taiwan in 3G service and value-added service.

As part of the company`s plan to tap the mainland market, Lu last year visited many times his counterparts at China Telecom and China Unicom to talk about cooperation in laying submarine cable linking Taiwan and the mainland, and collaboration in mobile service and value-added service.

Chunghwa is also interested in investing in Southeast Asian telecom market.

Last year alone, the company spent as much as NT$6 billion (US$187 million at US$1: NT$32) on investment cases.

source:cens