In May 2002, China, the world's biggest wireless market, saw fewer new cell phone subscribers than in any of the last six months. 4.8 million subscribers were added in May, down from 5.1 million in April.

This casts doubt on the Chinese Ministry of Information's projection that 55 million new cell phone users will be added this year.

China is currently the worlds largest mobile phone market, with GSM and CDMA technologies dominating. China Unicom is the largest (GSM) operator in China.