China's telecommunications regulator may approve as soon as May several domestic private companies applying to offer mobile communications services directly to consumers.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said it will give the go-ahead "as soon as in May" to the applications sent in by the companies, according to media reports yesterday.

The firms will be allowed to offer mobile services directly through purchasing bandwidth from China Mobile, China Telecom and China Unicom, which have to provide bandwidth at "fair or favorable" prices - a first step in opening up the state-controlled industry, the ministry said in January.

Software firm Ufida confirmed yesterday it had applied for the services, as had home appliance chain retailer Suning. Other possible firms included Tencent and Alibaba, industry sources said.

The ministry was not available to comment on the issue yesterday.

According to its statement, the ministry is proposing a two-year trial to allow companies to repackage and rebrand services to consumers.

The new policy, which may create "virtual carriers," is also a new opportunity for companies such as Tencent and media groups to penetrate the mobile Internet sector, according to analysts.

Ufida, which has 1.8 million enterprise clients in the Asia- Pacific region, plans to provide better cloud computing service to allow them to share, edit and transfer data and files on an Internet-based cloud server.

The move marks China's latest bid to promote and attract private funds to the telecom industry so that competition and service quality are enhanced, the ministry said.

Private firms, which must have telecom experience and a team of over 50 people, can apply for the services.