China Unicom may join undersea cable venture

China Unicom, Taiwan's Chunghwa Telecom and Japan's KDDI Corp are reportedly planning to spend $500 million to build a new submarine communications cable in the Asia-Pacific region.

The Commercial Times, citing unnamed Chunghwa Telecom sources, reported yesterday that the three companies were in talks with Singapore Telecommunications and its local rival Starhub to lay the Asia-Pacific Cable Network 3 (APCN3).

The Taiwan newspaper said once the Singapore partner was selected, the four companies would sign a memorandum of understanding on the project as early as next month.