Shares of AAC Acoustic Technologies Holdings rose 15.4 percent on their trading debut Tuesday, as investors bet the potential growth in third-generation mobile phone markets will continue to spur demand for handsets.

Shares of AAC, which specializes in developing tailor-made products for handset producers such as Motorola and Sony Ericsson, soared as much as 20 percent to HK$3.27 in early trading before closing at HK$3.15, about 15 percent above the initial offer price of HK$2.73 each.

Market observers said the share price gained support from fund managers, who expect the handset market to pick up with the continued launch of 3G worldwide as well as the 3.5G handsets that will emerge next year.

According to IDC, an independent global market research firm, worldwide shipments of handsets will increase from 692 million units last year to 932 million in 2009.

Handset-maker Nokia, which is based in Finland, said global handset sales will increase at least 9 percent to 650 million this year, from 600 million last year.

AAC's net profit rose 33 percent to 198.34 million yuan (HK$190.15 million) last year, compared with 149.11 million yuan a year ago. For the first three months of this year, the net profit was 42.73 million yuan.

``We are confident of [our] second-half result as the handset market is growing faster than expected,'' chief executive Benjamin Pan said at the listing ceremony Tuesday. Apart from the handset components design, the company plansto produce more high value-added components for products like MP3 players and digital cameras to diversify its revenue stream.

AAC raised HK$850 million in its first share sale, selling 312 million shares at HK$2.73 each, the mid-price of the indicated price range of HK$$2.38 and HK$2.82 each.

The retail and institutional portions were 1.39 times and nine times covered.