Interfax-China notes that the country’s mobile phone market has seen the entrance of two new players, Aigo and Sharp. Domestic consumer electronics firm Aigo launched its first mobile phone, the touchscreen a100, on September 9, and the news agency reports that the vendor plans to launch future handsets in the country based on local 3G standard TD-SCDMA and rival global standards CDMA2000 and WCDMA. Meanwhile Japan’s largest phone manufucturer Sharp launched its SH8010c mobile handset for the Chinese market on September 5, following launch of the SH9010C model in June. The company first entered the Chinese handset market in 2003 but exited in 2005 before returning. Last month Sharp said it aims to sell 13 million handsets in China in 2010. Interfax-China also reported this week that Japanese vendor Panasonic has denied rumours it is planning a return to the Chinese handset market. Other Japanese mobile phone manufacturers that have exited the Chinese market include Kyocera, which pulled out of the sector in January, and NEC, which exited in 2006.

Aigo and Sharp face strong competition in the Chinese market from handset vendors from across the globe. According to Interfax-China data, Nokia dominated GSM domestic mobile phone shipments in July with 4.16 million units, followed by Samsung (1.94 million units) and K-Touch (0.91 million units). Huawei led CDMA domestic shipments (0.36 million units), followed by Samsung (0.26 million units) and Motorola (0.24 million units).