Taiwan Cellular (TCC, 台灣大哥大), which currently operates 300 outlets under the name Teleshop Corp (台灣電店), will join forces with Arcoa Corp (全虹通信) and Aurora Communications to sell cell phones and related accessories.
Teleshop Corp will join Arcoa's 400 outlets and Aurora's 230 outlets.
In the long term, Taiwan Cellular hopes to oversee a distribution network consisting of 1,000 stores, thus weaving a web extending throughout the country, giving it about one-third of the domestic communication distribution network.
Yen Hong-tu (
Retail telecom store numbers have been falling over the last year with a total of 2,000 outlets closing because of market saturation.
Back in May, Aurora made plans to close a third of its 300 sales outlets and reassign workers to businesses due to slowing demand.
Overly enthusiastic market demand estimates and the slow uptake of second generation mobile Internet services, general packet radio service, have combined with an already over-saturated mobile phone market to dampen sales in the local market this year.
The mobile phone penetration rate in Taiwan already stands at over 80 percent, with 18 million mobile phone accounts currently running.
With such a large number of people already using mobile phones and the lack of any significant reason for them to upgrade, is causing the local market to stagnate.
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