Research In Motion, the Canadian wireless communications company known for its BlackBerry handheld device, has confirmed to the Chinese media that it has set up a branch in China and has appointed Gregory Shea, vice president for RIM's government relations in Asia Pacific, as president of RIM China.
RIM has reportedly set up its Chinese headquarters in Beijing and opened offices in Shanghai and Guangzhou. RIM previously launched BlackBerry services with China Mobile to its users in China and another Chinese telecom operator, China Telecom, has expressed wishes to also introduce this smartphone product.
Graduating from the University of British Columbia with a master degree of science, Shea came to China in 1987 as an invited foreign expert by the Chinese government. He previously worked for Sun Microsystems and the U.S. Information Technology Office, and joined RIM in 2008 as vice president for RIM's government relations in Asia Pacific. In his new post, Shea will be responsible for the establishment and development of RIM's partner relations and promote BlackBerry's development in China.
I'm traveling to China for a conference next week in Beijing. What is the likelihood that I will be able to freely use my Blackberry for both messaging and voice?
Does anybody know what a typical roaming fee might be if I use my phone that is based in Toronto?
Hi Ashley
I use my Blackberry in China to access voice & mail without problem. We also have clients using their our mobile learning platform installed on their Blackberrys without problem.
Check with your carrier to ensure that your account has an international roaming agreement with one of the chinese carriers & they should give you pricing.. Calls for me are about US$1.50 a min & e-mail about 80kb per US$1.
If you can use the BBerry wi-fi to download e-mails in some of the free hotspots that will be cheaper.
And if you will be doing a lot of local calls you may be advised to take an old unlocked phone and buy a local Chinese SIM card… Or your hotel can possibley advise wher you can rent a phone..
Hope it helps.
Andrew Lupton
GM China
Intuition
Right, you should usually have no problem with the BB in China bt as of this week all hell has broken loose and sms and emails are going sloooooooooooow probably because of the big October First anniversary coming up.