With one new user signing up for phone services every second for the last decade, Telstra Corporation Chairman Robert Mansfield is optimistic that the rapid growth in the region will continue.

"We are targeting the Asian region because we believe this is where most of the business opportunities are," he told the audience at a Chamber luncheon on December 10. "The region as a whole accounts for over half of the world's population -- more, if only people under 30 are considered."

Asia is also leading the world in mobile usage and development of applications. Part of wireless's remarkable advances in Asia are attributable to mobile pioneers in Japan and Korea.

On the other hand, for the less developed countries where telephony penetration has been slow, mobile penetration is now well above that of fixed line access. Cambodia, for example, now has a wireless penetration of eight times more than that of fixed lines.

"China has a population of over 1.2 billion people, with wireless penetration of around 15 per cent. The growth is still continuing and predictions are the market will add over 60 million customers year-on-year," he said. "Vietnam has 85 million people with 2 per cent mobile penetration, and is at a very early stage of opening up their telecommunications market. In India, a country with 1 billion people, wireless penetration is below 1 per cent."

Another area of strong growth in Asia has been the Internet. At the end of 2001 the region had some 160 million users, accounting for a third of the world's total.

What's more impressive is that out of the top-12 broadband Internet economies worldwide, five of them are in Asia, with Korea and Hong Kong being on the top of the league, he said.

The rapid adoption of mobiles, combined with mobile Internet access is a formula for consumers to go straight into the latest wireless and Internet services. "The mindset of these consumers is very different to those of neighbouring countries which have been brought up with fixed line services," he said.

But while the Asia telecommunications market is an exciting one, the investor sentiment around the world for this sector is still negative. Many areas are struggling to recover or survive from the after-effects of significant capacity over-build, falling prices and high licence costs.

Telstra in confident about the Asian market, and through focusing its operations and creating value for customers, the company will be able to grow in this part of the world, Mr Mansfield said. But expanding into Asia is not easy, and anyone who says it is obviously doesn't know the market, he added.

"Despite current market sentiment, we plan to execute our strategies. We have the financial and intellectual resources to do this. This will involve partnerships and different approaches than we take in Australia," he said.

He will also be keeping a close eye on the competition and watch trends in neighbouring markets, such as mobile broadband Internet access in Korea. But he points out that what may work in Japan or Korea may not necessarily work in other markets.

"You have to look how you can take those technologies and apply them in your local market. Once a market has one participant heading in that direction, the whole market will follow," he said.