The story
The company originated as a government agency of the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications. On 27 April 1995, it was registered as a separate legal entity as Directorate General of Telecommunications, P&T, China, using "China Telecom" as brand name. On 17 May 2000 it was registered as China Telecommunications Corporation. In May 2002, China Netcom Corporation was spun off as a separate company that was also supervised by the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council directly. It also owned subsidiaries in Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Henan and Shandong that formerly belonged to China Telecommunications Corporation. According to the United States Department of Defense, the company has links to the People's Liberation Army.
On 10 September 2002, a subsidiary, China Telecom, was listed. The listed company gradually acquired the assets from China Telecommunications Corporation. As of 31 December 2016, however, China Telecommunications Corporation still owned the controlling stake in the company, for 70.89%.
In 2009 China Telecommunications Corporation received some of the assets of China Satellite Communications.
The company provides fixed-line and Xiaolingtong (Personal Handy-phone System) telephone services to 216 million people as of April 2008, and broadband internet access to over 38 million subscribers, providing approximately 62% (46 Gbit/s) of China's internet bandwidth. On 2 June 2008, China Telecommunications Corporation announced that it would purchase China Unicom's nationwide CDMA business and assets for CN¥110 billion, giving it 43 million mobile subscribers. According to the company, the listed portion of China Telecom Group (China Telecom Corp., Ltd.) paid CN¥43.8 billion, the unlisted portion of China Telecom Group (China Telecommunications Corporation) paid CN¥66.2 billion.
On 7 January 2009, China Telecommunications Corporation was awarded CDMA 2000 license to expand its business to 3G telecommunication.
U.S. sanctions
In November 2020, U.S. President Donald Trump issued an executive order prohibiting U.S. companies and individuals from owning shares in companies that the United States Department of Defense has listed as having links to the People's Liberation Army, which included China Telecom. In consequence of the executive order, the New York Stock Exchange delisted China Telecom in January 2021.
In December 2020, the United States Federal Communications Commission (FCC) initiated proceedings to revoke China Telecom's authorization to operate in the U.S. due to national security concerns. In October 2021, the FCC revoked China Telecom's operating license in the U.S. In March 2022, the FCC designated a U.S. subsidiary of the company, China Telecom (Americas) Corp, a national security threat. In December 2024, the United States Department of Commerce moved to crack down on China Telecom's cloud and internet routing business in the U.S.
From Wikipedia’s article on China Telecommunications Corporation, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.5