Rapid IT Development in China Adds High-Tech Momentum to Beijing's Olympic Bid According to The Organizing Committee of The China-Beijing International High Tech Industries Week.

Business/Technology Editors

BEIJING--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 29, 2001

"China Beijing International High Tech Industries Week" Adds

US$7.4 Billion to China's Fastest Growing Sector

The fourth annual China-Beijing International High Tech Industries Week (CBHT Week, May 10-15) has attracted a record US$7.4 billion-plus in new investment pledges, further prompting China's fastest growing sector and showcasing the rapid changes underway in China's capital city as it prepares to host the 2008 Olympics Games. The conference--aimed at developing multi-lateral economic and technological cooperation--brought together 1,300 attendees from over nearly 70 overseas business and government entities and leaders from China's fledgling high-tech sector to Beijing.

The success of China Beijing International High Tech Industries and the growing momentum in Beijing's technology markets is set to speed up the city's overall exposure, access to new economy technologies and emergence as a major regional business center. China's bid to host the Olympics and their impending entry into the World Trade Organization are seen as the two main catalysts for their recent economic and technological surges.

"The China Beijing International High Tech Industries Week convention reflects the level and speed of technological advancement in China," said Liu Jingmin, Vice Mayor of Beijing and Executive Vice President of the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games Bid Committee. "Beijing's Olympics Bid is clearly strengthened by these developments--we plan the most high-tech Olympics ever, enhancing the Olympic experience by uniting the world through sport via the most leading-edge information technologies."

The China Beijing International Hi-tech Industries Week convention enticed some of the world's premier high-tech multinational corporations to Beijing, including Nokia, General Electric, and NEC. Foreign government delegations, venture capitalists and the largest domestic hi-tech companies in China also participated. The exhibition occupied a total area of 100,000 square meters, 10 times larger than the first fair held in 1998.

Some of the key investments generated at CBHT included $1.2 billion for the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (BDA), the capital's first economic development zone, and $816 million in investment from forty agreements with both domestic and foreign partners for the Zhongguancun Science & Technology Park, dubbed China's "Silicon Valley

"This fair is boosting the city's high-tech industrialization," said Mr Yao Wang, Executive Vice Secretary General of the Organizing Committee of CBHT. "It will help commercialize high-tech innovations developed in Beijing, and get our high-tech industries involved in the process of economic globalization."

A special section of the High Tech week exhibition showcases innovative new technology applications for a Beijing 2008 Olympics. Some of the Olympic-specific advances planned for the city include:

- Utilization of solar energy in public areas and clean gas in public
transport. To date, some 30,000 public buses and taxis are pollution-free

- Application of intelligent transport systems to aide in navigation around
potentially difficult traffic conditions as well as a mini-satellite used for
surveillance of ground conditions with the capability of translating pictures
into virtual reality images.

- Addition to Beijing's current one million km of optical fiber and one of the
largest SDH metropolitan networks in the world by expanding fiber optics to
cover all Olympic sites, providing a secure broadband network to deliver the
Games to the world. Fixed line telephone and data transmission infrastructure
will provide all of the necessary capacity for IN and IP based customer
services.

- Introduction of a mobile communication network capable of handling 500,000
calls in the Olympic site area. GSM and IS-95 CDMA are now available in China,
and international roaming is offered to 104 overseas operators. 3G is expected
to dominate by 2008 when total capacity will reach 15.1 million.

- Establishment of a digital cable TV network capable of HDTV transmission for
all Olympic venues

- Development of a dedicated digital Olympic trunk radio system to provide
capacity for 15,000 handsets in 1,000 talk groups. The system will be
independent of the public trunk radio system, guaranteeing access at all times.


- Installation of GPS technology to cover all Olympic transport routes to be
used both for the Olympics and public transport.

- Enhancement of televised transmission of the Games both internationally and
domestically, by the addition of new submarine optical cables to the six
already in operation, five satellites, and transportable transmitting satellite
earth stations.

The scale of the tech changes in China and the success of the fair reflect the importance of technology to China's economic ascent. Statistics provided by the General Administration of Customs show that China's total import and export of high and new technology products amounted to US$89.55 billion last year. According to Beijing's 10th Five-Year Plan (2005-2010), hi-tech industries will be key to the city's targeted 9% per annum economic growth rate.

Edward Tian, the 37-year-old CEO of China Netcom Communications (CNC) one of the largest telecoms in China and a participant in CBHT week, explains that the massive technological build-up for the Games and the new worldwide economy is a surmountable challenge for the people who built the Great Wall. "Our company CNC built and went live with a 8,500 km fiber network in 10 months. It took Sprint two to three years to do this in the United States," explains Tian. "China's dedication to the Games and to becoming a technological powerhouse go hand-in-hand. We recognize that both will help open our country and our people to the world."

Beijing is one of five cities bidding to host the 2008 Olympics, a recent IOC report hailed Beijing's readiness to "organize an excellent Olympic Games" and a Beijing Olympics' opportunity to "leave a unique legacy to China and to sport."