China Tower: Efficiency Improvements in Maintenance Operations

China Tower Co., Ltd. (China Tower) is China’s largest provider of telecommunications tower infrastructure services and plays a critical role in the country’s 5G network deployment. As 5G base stations proliferated, the Harbin Branch of China Tower faced rising maintenance costs and increasing operational complexity, particularly in managing power outages under tight time constraints.

After discontinuing outsourced maintenance and adopting centralised scheduling, the Harbin Branch piloted a smart maintenance platform in Nangang District of Harbin City. The pilot demonstrated promising improvements in outage response and cost efficiency. In June 2022, Mingyao Chen, Vice President of the Harbin Branch, faced a key managerial decision: whether, and how, to expand the smart maintenance platform to other districts across Harbin City. The case invites students to evaluate the trade-offs involved in scaling a data-driven operational system, considering organisational readiness, governance design, and operational risk.

Students will be able to analyse - operational challenges of maintaining large-scale infrastructure under uncertainty; trade-offs of decision-making and algorithm-driven optimisation; challenges in scaling a digital operations platform; rollout strategies that balance efficiency gains with operational risk and governance considerations. The case is suitable for undergraduate and graduate courses in Operations Management, Business Analytics, and Strategy.

Inspection copies and teaching notes are available for university faculty. To receive an inspection copy and teaching note, please email ccxshop@smu.edu.sg with your registered faculty email ID and a link to your contact information on the faculty directory at your university as verification. An inspection copy and teaching note will then be sent to your faculty email account.

Download information

SMU Faculty/Staff can download the case & teaching note on iNet with your SMU login ID & Password via the following links:

·      The Case (SMU-25-0040)

·      Teaching Note (SMU-25-0040TN)

For purchase of the case and supplementary materials via The Case Centre, please access the following links:

·      The Case (SMU-25-0040)

·      Teaching Note (SMU-25-0040)

For purchase of the case and supplementary materials via Harvard Business Publishing, please access the following links:

·      The Case (SMU-25-0040)

·      Teaching Note (SMU-25-0040)