The latest statistics from the Ministry of Information Industry shows that by the end of April 2006, there were more than 770 million telephone users in China, of which over 416 million were mobile phone users and more than 360 million were fixed-line phone users.

The statistics shows that in the first fourth months of the year, mobile phone users increased rapidly with a monthly increase of 5.8 million, which was about 23.2 million more compared with the end of last year.

The statistics also show that from January to April, 46.5% more short messages were sent compared with the same period of last year, reaching 132.25 billion in total.

Also in the period, the total telecom income reached CNY208.16 billion, an increase of 11.5% year on year.