On January 8, 2004, the board of directors of ZTE announced that the Company achieved contracted sales of USD3.46 billion in 2003 with an increase of 50% over 2002. Contracted sales of handsets recorded USD583 million with a year-on-year increase of 66.3%. Contracted sales in overseas markets recorded USD610 million with a year-on-year increase of 100%.

In the last three years, ZTE has maintained a compound growth rate of 34.1% in contracted sales. It has become a focus of attention as one of the telecom equipment manufacturers with the most diversely competitive services and equipment in global telecom area.

In 2003, ZTE recorded a balanced increase in wireless, wired and handset products. In addition, ZTE began to reap revenues from overseas markets. Both the domestic market and the overseas market develop in-phase.

ZTE delivers CDMA, GSM and PHS products as its wireless solution and has become the best wireless equipment supplier in China. In China Unicom’s tender invitation for CDMA Phase III construction, ZTE won new contracts to supply 3 million lines of products and its main equipment began to serve China Unicom’s 15 provincial branch companies. ZTE is the only Chinese manufacturer holding a complete set of independently developed BSC and switching systems.    

The PHS equipment successfully captured new market shares in Guangdong, Tianjin, Hunan, Jiangsu, Shanxi, Beijing and Shanghai, and market share has increased to 40%, with a total of more than 20 million lines of equipment operating over the network. 

ZTE’s GSM equipment achieved a historic breakthrough and was widely deployed in the local networks including Beijing, Shandong, Xinjiang and Hebei. In terms of its market share, ZTE ranks first in China’s 3.5G broadband wireless access market. 

ZTE’s ADSL products serve six large cities-Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Nanjing, Wuhan and Xian with over 5 million lines of product running over the network. ZTE’s high-end optical transport products were selected to build China Telecom’s Northwest Ring and China Unicom’s Xinjiang Branch territorial DWDM network. The contracted sales of optical transport products achieved a year-on-year increase of over 30% in 2003. 

In the handset market, ZTE’s practice of developing equipment independently has become more and more advantage. Contracted sales of GSM, CDMA and PHS handset products accounted for 20% of ZTE’s total. At the end of 2003, the monthly shipment exceeded 1 million sets; the total shipment of 2003 achieved 4.5 million sets. In September 2003 ZTE CDMA handset won the title of “Famous Chinese Brand”. In November 2003, ZTE invited the world famous artist Li Jet to be the image representative of ZTE handsets, a new milestone of ZTE’s handset brand building.    

The year 2003 witnessed the further implementation of ZTE’s globalization strategy. ZTE’s products successfully entered 13 new countries; and with 10 additional maintenance offices established overseas, the employees of international department increased 100%. The main products, such as mobile, switch, transport and data communication products achieved large-scale sales in India, Pakistan, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia and Nigeria.
  
After years of research and development, ZTE’s GSM cellular mobile systems had great success in the overseas market, with contracted sales of USD150 million in 2002. The total capacity of ZTE’s CDMA equipment has exceeded 12 million lines and has been widely deployed in more than 20 countries all over the world.   

In 2003 there are many successful cases to be considered. ZTE built the first nationwide NGN in the world for Romania; ZTE’s ADSL products serve the Athens Olympic Games 2004; ZTE undertook the OADM metro network in Hong Kong; ZTE’s switches won the contract for the American tandem office; and ZTE constructed the first railway dedicated communication network for Vietnam. In the telecom winter, ZTE is bringing more energy and change to the international telecom market 

Looking forward to 2004, broadband data communication and wireless communication continue to be the focus of market competition in China, and the handset manufacturers holding independent technologies will enjoy more competitive advantages. The markets of developing countries will grow faster and the markets of developed countries are also regaining pace. In the forthcoming year, it is predicted that ZTE will continue its growth momentum, based on the overseas market and handset products.