[June 03, 2013] Tencent Not Qualified as Virtual Carrier Tweet BEIJING, Jun 03, 2013 (SinoCast Daily Business Beat via COMTEX) -- Top three mobile carriers China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom have all started pilot mobile communication resale service, offering possibility for private investors to invest in telecom industry and become virtual carriers. Virtual carriers are wholesalers qualified by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) to purchase voice, data and short message services from China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom and then sell them to consumers. Since the MIIT has clear requirements for the foreign shareholding of applicants for virtual carriers, Internet companies with complex shareholding structure like Baidu Inc. (Nasdaq: BIDU), Tencent Holdings Limited (SEHK: 0700) and Alibaba Group are not qualified for application. Telecom experts believed that first group of successful bidders may include Suning Commerce Group Co., Ltd. (SZSE: 002024) and Gome Electrical Appliances Holding Ltd. (SEHK: 0493) while the possibility is rather small for Tencent, since the latter has no abundant outlets nationwide to serve customers as required for virtual carriers. Source: www.163.com (June 03, 2013) [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]