China Daily:

Due to the impact of the international environment and the domestic COVID-19 epidemic, downward pressure on the economy has continued to mount this year. However, we have noticed that the information and telecom industry has maintained overall stability and become a bright spot for economic development in H1. Please give us an introduction to the development of the information and telecom industry. Thank you.

Wang Peng:

Thanks for your question. In H1, we earnestly implemented the decisions and arrangements of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, remained committed to the general principle of pursuing progress while ensuring stability, and tried our best to overcome the impact of the epidemic. We accelerated the integration of information and telecom technology through all sectors of the economy and society, and consolidated healthy trends toward stable growth for the industry.

First, emerging growth drivers continued to grow. In H1, the total volume of the telecom businesses grew by 22.7% year on year, and their revenue increased by 8.3%, 5.8 percentage points higher than GDP growth, contributing significantly to economic growth. The industry structure has been optimized, and emerging businesses, including internet data centers, big data, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things became important driving forces. In H1, the revenue of emerging businesses reached 162.4 billion yuan, up 36.3% year on year, accounting for 19.9% of the entire industry. The industrial transformation has achieved remarkable results.

Second, our supporting role became prominent. From the vantage point of network construction, infrastructure stayed ahead. The integration of a "double gigabit" network further advanced, covering 400 million households with gigabit optical fiber networks. A total of 1.854 million 5G base stations were established and opened, 300,000 of which were newly opened in Q2. We made the realization of "5G access to every county and broadband access to every village." The number of national-level internet backbone direct connection points reached 19, while network delay and packet loss rates dropped significantly. From the vantage point of serving social development, the empowerment of integrated application accelerated. We sped up the integrated application of 5G and gigabit optical fiber networks in industry, medical care, education, transportation, and other fields. The number of 5G application cases exceeded 20,000. The industrial internet has been expanded in industrial clusters, green, low-carbon, safe production, and other sectors, creating many new benchmarks at the workshop level, enterprise level, and cluster level.

Third, domestic demand has been expanded to help unleash potential. In terms of investment, in H1, fixed-asset investment in telecommunications reached 189.4 billion yuan, up 24.6% year on year, 18.5 percentage points higher than the national growth rate of fixed-asset investment (excluding rural households), which created new growth in communication manufacturing, internet, and software services amid the epidemic. In terms of consumption, mobile internet traffic increased by 20.2% year on year. Online applications such as online office work, livestreaming, online food delivery, and short videos flourished, and information consumption continued to expand and upgrade.

Fourth, digital facilities to benefit the people have become more robust. It is mainly reflected in the following three improvements. First, user service awareness has been improved, and basic telecom enterprises have realized cross-regional handling of common telecom services such as the "Family Network." Meanwhile, 33 key internet companies have established manual customer service hotlines, and 137 companies are connected to the internet information service complaint platform. Second, information accessibility has improved, and the aging-friendly transformation of internet applications has been further advanced. For example, 452 websites and apps completed the aging-friendly transformation and passed the test and evaluation. Third, the protection of user rights and interests has been improved, and a total of 6.3 million app tests have been completed, realizing the full coverage of apps on the shelves of mainstream application stores in China, and app management capabilities have been significantly enhanced.

Next, the MIIT will continue to accelerate network construction and integrate innovative applications following the decisions and arrangements of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council and continuously promote the high-quality development of the information and communication industry. The first is to clear the information artery, deepen the joint construction and sharing of 5G, and continue to improve the depth and breadth of "dual-gigabit" network coverage. We will continue to promote universal telecom services and strive to build 600,000 5G base stations this year, with more than 2 million total. The second is to cultivate new momentum for development. We will accelerate the promotion and upgrading of the industrial internet, promote the pilot demonstration of the industrial internet in an integrated manner, and implement the "10, 100, and 1000" program of 5G industry applications. This will mean selecting 10 vertical industries, with each industry forming 100 benchmarks, and building 1,000 5G industry virtual private networks, to help the digital transformation of the industry. The third is to enhance people's sense of gain. We will further implement the aging-friendly transformation and upgrading projects on internet applications, strengthen the protection of the rights and interests of telecom and internet users, further regulate the operating behavior of basic telecom companies and internet companies, and create a favorable environment for information consumption. The fourth is to build up a safety fence. We will improve the capabilities of internet service and emergency response, strengthen cybersecurity guarantee, improve the security management system in the integrated fields of the industrial internet and the internet of vehicles (IoV), and promote the accelerated development of cyberspace security industry. Thanks!