China has over 900 million mobile phone users

China had more than 900 million mobile phone subscribers at the end of April with nearly two-thirds of the world's most populous nation using cellular technology, the government said Tuesday.

The nation's army of mobile phone users grew by over 41 million in the first quarter of 2011, bringing the total number of cell phone subscribers to 900.39 million, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said.

Mobile phone use has exploded in China in recent years as handset prices and user charges have dropped, while the continual arrival of new technologies on the market has spurred sales.

According to government figures, China had 565 million mobile phone subscribers in February 2009.

In the first quarter of 2011, China's telecommunication industry reported a 9.4 percent growth year-on-year on business revenue valued at 308.36 billion yuan ($47.44 billion), the ministry said.

As of the end of April, third generation (3G) mobile telecommunication users in China reached 67.57 million, nearly 21 million more than at the end of 2010.

Last week, the ministry announced the number of Internet users in China, already the world's largest online market, hit 477 million at the end of March.

The number of people using the Internet in China had hit 457 million at the end of 2010, meaning that more than one-third of its 1.3 billion-strong population were online.

(c) 2011 AFP