China's Mobile Giants Squeezing Smaller Players

From vnunet:

"China's largest mobile telecoms service providers are expanding into new markets and cutting into the business of smaller players such as Tencent, Tom Online and Linktone, according to China-based market watchers.

As subscriber growth in China's mobile market begins to slow, giant firms like China Mobile and China Unicom are no longer content to focus purely on adding mobile users while leaving lucrative niches like wireless messaging to value-added providers.

China Mobile is no longer renewing some contracts with companies that use its network for instant messaging and other services, Interfax reported last week, and is introducing its own IM service.

China Unicom, the country's second largest mobile phone service provider, began to take similar action recently."