Background
Chang Xiaobing was born on March, 1957 Hebei, China.
小兵 常
Chang Xiaobing was born on March, 1957 Hebei, China.
A native of Hebei Province, Chang graduated in 1982 from the Nanjing Institute of Posts and Telecommunications with a BS degree in telecommunication engineering. He also received a masters degree in business administration from Tsinghua University in 2001, and a doctorate in business administration from Hong Kong Polytechnic University in 2005.
Chang has over 25 years of operational and managerial experience in the telecommunications industry in China. Prior to joining the Unicom Group, he served as a deputy director of the Bureau of Posts and Telecommunications in Jiangsu Province from 1993 to 1996, and for the next four years as a deputy director-general of the Department of Telecommunications Administration under the Ministry of Information Industry. In 2000 he was named the director of Telecommunications Administration, Ministry of Information Industry, a position he held until November 2004 when he was appointed the chairman of Unicom Group. While in the Ministry of Information Industry, he also served as vice president of China Telecom Group.
Founded as a state-owned corporation, China Unicom is a telecommunication operator in the People’s Republic of China, with 52.6 percent of the company controlled by the state-owned China Unicom Limited and China United Telecommunications Corporation Limited, while the remainder is traded on the Shenzhen, Hong Kong and New York stock exchanges. China Unicom was established on 19 July 1994, by the then Ministry of Electronic Industry (now the Ministry of Information Industry) and approved by the State Council. Started as a wireless paging and GSM mobile operator, it currently provides a wide range of services including nationwide GSM and CDMA mobile networks, long-distance, local calling, data communication, internet services and IP telephony in mainland China, and has operated a CDMA network in Macau since 18 October 2006. China Unicom is ranked as the second-largest CDMA provider in the world and the third-biggest mobile provider.
Chang has played a key role in the unprecedented growth of the Chinese telecommunication industry over recent years. While serving as vice president of China Telecom, the largest fixed-line telecommunication service provider in China, Chang oversaw its expansion into the North American market. In 2002, China Telecom became the first Chinese telecommunication company to establish operations in the United States with the opening of its Washington DC headquarters and a suite of single-provider, end-to-end telecom services to American corporations doing business in China. According to Chang, China continues to be a leading investment destination for American companies. They need a telecom partner who has the local experience and know how to get things done. Last year, China Telecom wired 20 million new residential and business lines to our voice network. That’s the equivalent of adding all the phone lines in the State of California in one year. We’re used to getting things done in China. Setting up China Telecom USA is the first step in our overseas development strategy. We’ll keep on this way (Business Wire, 2002). After Chang took over China Unicom, he still regarded international cooperation as a vital strategy for corporate success. In 2006, the company entered into a strategic alliance framework agreement with SK Telecom of South Korea, and issued convertible bonds in an aggregated principal amount of 1 billion US dollars to the same company.
Under Chang’s able leadership, China Unicom experienced tremendous growth. By the end of June 2006, it had reached over 135 million cellular subscribers, representing a net increase of 7.29 million as compared with the previous year. Apart from a steady expansion in its mobile business, the company’s value-added services also achieved robust growth, as total revenue from wireless value-added services reached 8 billion yuan (1 billion US dollars), representing an increase of 49 percent over 2005. The company’s long-distance, data and internet business also saw significant profitability improvements after China Unicom restructured its product mix. More recently, the returns in 2008 more than doubled 2007 earnings as the company vied with China Mobile for rural subscribers and more users switched from traditional phones to wireless services.
Related to the ongoing reform of the ministries and the re-shuffling of state-owned companies under the State Council, the year 2008 will be critical for all major telecommunication providers in China. As the industry is gearing up for the largest restructuring in history, the shake-up will affect every telecom giant including China Mobile, China Unicom, China Telecom and China Netcom. Regardless of the outcome, Chang Xiaobing will likely play an important role in the continual development of the telecommunications industry in China, already the largest in the world.