The Fourth China International Software & Information Service Fair will be held from June 22 to 25, 2006 in Dalian, a port city in northeast China's Liaoning Province.

Dalian Vice Mayor Dai Yulin made the announcement Thursday at a press conference.

The fair, which will be jointly sponsored by seven ministries including the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Information Industry, the Ministry of Education and the Liaoning Provincial government, is the only national software fair in China, and the largest fair of this kind in the country, according to Dai.

The First China International Software & Information Service Fair took place in 2003, with an expo area of 11,000 square meters. The expo area of the fourth software fair is expected to reach 33,000 square meters and house 1,400 booths. About 1,000 domestic and foreign companies will take part, including GE, Sony and Dell, he said.

Activities during the fair will include a conference on innovation in China's software industry, an international seminar on global software and information services, a software outsourcing meeting, an IT financing and investment forum, and an international symposium on IT personnel training that will help to enhance exchanges between software developers and consumers, said Dai.

The fair, which is held annually, has boosted Dalian's income from software sales and exports which have grown at a rate of 60 percent since 2003.

(Xinhua News Agency December 23, 2005)