China Unicom net profit nearly triples

HONG KONG, March 15 (Reuters) - China Unicom (Hong Kong) Limited said on Thursday its net profit for 2017 nearly tripled on cost savings. China's second-biggest telecoms carrier by subscriber numbers had flagged the jump in profit earlier this month.

Profit attributable to shareholders last year was 1.83 billion yuan ($289.03 million) after a one-off asset write off of 2.9 billion yuan, the company said in a filing to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.

Revenue rose 0.2 percent to 274.8 billion yuan.

Its 4G subscribers rose by 70.33 million to 175 million.

China Unicom (Hong Kong) is an indirect subsidiary of Shanghai-listed China United Network Communications, which is undergoing a pilot ownership reform initiated by Beijing.

Following a private placement totalling $12 billion, China's largest tech firms, including Alibaba Holdings, Tencent Holdings, Baidu Inc and JD.com have become new shareholders and board members of the Shanghai company.

Jefferies analyst Edison Lee said before Thursday's results were out that China Unicom was "kitchen sinking costs" to create a clean slate for the new financial year under the new ownership structure. ($1 = 6.3315 Chinese yuan renminbi) (Reporting by Sijia Jiang Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman)