China's IT-related consumption hits $223b in Jan-May

BEIJING - China consumed 1.38 trillion yuan ($223.3 billion) in information technology-related products and services in the first five months of the year, up 19.8 percent year-on-year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said Friday.

The consumption of communications services, software technology services and information technology terminal products rose 8.7 percent, 25.9 percent and 25.7 percent year-on-year, respectively.

The e-commerce sector's total transaction volume increased 46 percent from the same period last year to reach 4.01 trillion yuan, the MIIT said in an online statement.

Mobile Internet data consumption also surged due to the growing popularity of instant messaging applications, particularly those used on smartphones.

Mobile instant messaging applications like WeChat have garnered a userbase of 486 million people thus far, contributing to a 60.9-percent increase in mobile Internet data traffic and a 56.8-percent rise in related revenues during the January-May period, according to MIIT data.