China VoIP Takes Off, in Legal and Illegal Forms

• Posted: Wednesday, March 07, 2007
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• Author: pradhana
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• Filed under: Broadband, China, VoIP

Long distance is expensive in China, which is making voice over IP (VoIP) a big hit there, according to In-Stat.

Broadband VoIP subscribers who get their service from telecom carriers are estimated to number 9.53 million by the end of 2011, up from 720,000 in 2006. Both standard VoIP service and IP-based calling cards are selling briskly.

Only traditional service providers are allowed to legally provide broadband VoIP in China, but demand is so great that an illegal option already has over a million subscribers.

"Virtual VoIP carriers (VVCs) provide PC to phone services by deploying soft-switching systems on Internet and media gateways between the Internet and public switched telephone networks," reported Kevin Li of In-Stat.

"They operate illegally and have little phone-number resources (most subscribers can only make outgoing calls). However, due to intense competition among voice service providers, and VVCs' lower price compared with traditional long-distance calling or IP card services, VVCs are having success."

VVC consumer broadband IP telephony subscribership is estimated to reach 12.96 million by 2011, up from 1.23 million at the end of 2006. [eMarketer]

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