According to exclusive information from informed sources, in the first 11 months leading up to 2025, only four provincial branches of China Telecom saw a year-on-year increase in their share of government and enterprise (政企) project wins, while a significant 27 branches experienced a decline. This situation is genuinely concerning! Yet, it is not entirely unexpected.
It is understood that the growth trend for the four branches that saw an increase is not particularly pronounced, while among the 27 declining branches, some have seen a severe drop exceeding 10%. Overall, growth in bid-winning share in the government-enterprise market has hit a bottleneck for most.
In fact, the development of the government-enterprise market for telecom operators has been extremely challenging over the past two years. In the fierce competition to secure contracts, operators have resorted to "floor prices," a price war that is truly damaging and has led to a further compression of profit margins.
Simultaneously, even after winning bids, operators face risks of overdue payments and bad debts. This is because government and enterprise clients have long, complex, and often unpredictable payment cycles. Consequently, the scale of bad debts for the three major operators has continued to expand in recent years.
It is evident that the government-enterprise market has now entered a phase of sluggish growth. Without implementing significant changes, it might be better to not bid at all. Therefore, the severe decline in China Telecom's bid-winning performance in this sector is hardly surprising.
Liu Qing, Director of the Communications Business Department at Operators Finance Network, stated that competition in the government-enterprise market has reached a white-hot stage. He emphasized that if operators fail to make changes—such as reducing reliance on "price wars," focusing on core technology research and development, and cautiously assessing project risks—their future development will become even more difficult.
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