China Unicom up 11pc on eSIM nod

China Unicom's (0762) shares surged over 11 percent to close at HK$6 yesterday after three major mainland telecoms obtained the eSIM technology application services approval.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued an approval document, agreeing for China Mobile (0941), China Telecom (0728) and China Unicom to develop eSIM technology application services in the Internet of Things and other fields.

China Unicom's net profit for the first three quarters rose 10.19 percent year-on-year to 10.82 billion yuan (HK$12.6 billion).

The total revenue was up 3.79 percent to 225.36 billion yuan in the first nine months. The EBITDA was up 0.8 percent year-on-year to 73.7 billion yuan.

The number of mobile billing subscribers fell by 9.29 million to 309 million.

Meanwhile, Chinese technology companies including Huawei Technologies have expressed strong concerns to local regulators about Nvidia's proposed acquisition of Arm, potentially jeopardizing the US$40 billion (HK$312 billion) semiconductor deal.

Several of the country's most influential tech firms have been lobbying for the State Administration for Market Regulation to either reject the transaction or impose conditions to ensure their access to Arm technology, people familiar with the matter said. Chief among their concerns is that Nvidia may force the British firm to cut off Chinese clients.

Furthermore, Qualcomm estimates the 5G smartphone shipments will reach over 750 million units in 2022.