Mobile entertainment company Mtone Wireless Corporation recently announced the release of its new SMS game service for mobile phones, named Cell Phone.
The release of the game coincided with the recent release of blockbuster film director Feng Xiaogang's New Year's celebration movie, also named Cell Phone, of which Mtone is a co-sponsor.
It is estimated that China's SMS market is 25 times larger than its movie industry. China's mobile market will grow from 250 million subscribers in 2003 to 402 million subscribers by 2007. Vice President of China Mobile, Lu Xiangdong believes SMS has become a hot and growing industry. In 2002 alone, China Mobile's customers sent over 78.3 billion messages, and it is estimated that this year, the number of messages sent will soar aggressively. Games with enhanced functions and interactivity are developing at breakneck speed and have become an important new trend among SMS users. China Mobile hopes that the release of the "Cell Phone" game service, from Mtone Wireless, will mean nothing less than a breakthrough for the SMS market.
Headquartered in Santa Clara, California with its operations located in China, Mtone Wireless Corporation offers SMS subscription-based services to China's mobile market. SMS subscribers are able to use a variety of Mtone services that are in demand in a growing mobile market in China, such as "Bubble Boy"–a virtual pal service, and "Legend of the Three Realms"–an SMS RPG game that creates an entirely new mobile social network. The company provided the first commercial wireless stock trading and information service in China in 1998. Currently with over 5M paying users, the company is a pioneer and leading provider of mobile phone entertainment services in China.
