According to numerous reports on sina.com, the Ministry of Industry andInformation Technology is working with Chinese carriers to implement aReal Name Rule for handset subscribers. China has over 700mn wirelesssubscribers — of which 50% are non-contract users who are currently notrequired to present identification when purchasing a non-contract SIMcard. According to the news, this may change starting from as early asSeptember; and over the next three years, carriers will also need to identifyand register all existing non-contract subscribers. The main purpose of thenew rule is to prevent deceptive and unsolicited SMS messages and ads.
Asiainfo stands to benefit from likely CRM upgrade requirements。
We believe the potential new rule would require carriers to upgrade theirCRM system to: (1) register new non-contract subscribers, (2) efficientlyhandle and register millions of existing non-contract subscribers at branchoffices, and (3) offer effective packages to non-contract subscribers whocome to register. Since the change is nationwide, we estimate there wouldbe meaningful revenue opportunity for Asiainfo. However, our channelchecks indicate carriers have not yet requested their IT suppliers toupgrade their CRM system — which we think could mean deployment ofthe new rule may not actually be slated for September.
Mediatek could be affected with uncertainty on handset demand。
Currently, most non-contract cards are sold at sales outlets channel andnot at the carrier’s branch offices. It is not yet clear how carriers will workwith sales channels to collect identification information from new noncontractusers. If carriers do not have sufficient time to upgrade their CRMsystem and the new rule is implemented in September as reported, weexpect near-term uncertainty in non-contract user growth. Since most noncontractusers have low incomes — where Mediatek dominates marketshare for handset users — we believe the new rule may add uncertainty toMediatek handset sales during the October holiday. Long term, we believereal demand will not be affected by the new rule. In fact, if competitionamong carriers intensifies as they try to capture non-contract subscribersduring the registration process, the new rule could potentially expand theoverall non-contract subscriber base through price elasticity. We estimateMediatek 3Q revenue of NT$27.2bn, at the high-end of its guidance ofNT$25bn to NT$27bn, as its customers build up inventory for the holiday. 相关阅读