Jane Chen/ Shanghai Daily news

Germany-based electronics giant Simens AG and the domestic firm Konka Group announced plans to join the GT800 Alliance to develop the digital trunking communications technology, today's The Beijing News reported.
China's largest telecommunications firm, Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, established the alliance in May to promote its GT800 standard-based trunking technology, along with five other phone makers including Bird, Eastcom, Amoi, SAGEM, Kejian.
Huawei developed GT800 for GSM/TD-SCDMA networks; it can be used for conference calls, group calling, and voice deployment.
Trunking technologies are expected to be in large scale commercial use as of next year.
In 2003, the Ministry of Information Technology approved China Railway Communication Co. Ltd and China Satellite Communications Corp. to conduct trial testing on applications of digital trunking technologies.