China Telecom follows China Mobile's lead, hooks up with RIM to offer BlackBerry
China Mobile's recent announcement that it'd be getting really tight with RIM -- finally -- to offer a more official, customized BlackBerry experience to the locals than it had before must have sent off a wave of jealousy among carriers, because competitor China Telecom has wasted no time in following on with an announcement of its own. No roadmap has been set for when we might see devices in the marketplace -- the company says that it's still ironing out specifics with RIM -- but we figure this should be an easier rollout than China Mobile, since Telecom uses a hybrid (but well-understood) GSM / EV-DO infrastructure as opposed to Mobile's essentially one-off TD-SCDMA network. At a glance, it seems like devices like the Storm and Tour are basically ready to rock here, but there's no question RIM will need to work both with the carrier (to tailor the BlackBerry experience to the needs of a Chinese audience) and with the government, which probably doesn't love RIM's infrastructure any more than India does.
