Chinese 3G kicks off on 1 April

It looks like China’s 3G efforts are inching closer to reality. According to reports, China Mobile will kick off its trials of homegrown 3G standard TD-SCDMA in eight cities from 1 April: Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Shenyang, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Xiamen and Qinhuangdao.

Forbes says the operator will give away 20,000 TD-SCDMA mobile numbers free and will give way the same number of handsets for nothing, with other subscribers offered discounts of 100 to 200 yuan on their phones.

Things are certainly moving in the right direction for TD-SCDMA – and the Olympics looks like it’s figuring large in people’s minds: five out of the eight cities are Games venues.