On May 25, eight Asian telecom operators signed a MoU (Memorandum of Understanding), whereby they will jointly establish a Asia-Pacific undersea fiber-optic cable network, which is scheduled for completion by 2011, Taiwan's Commercial Times reported on May 26. Under terms of MoU, they will jointly invest approximately NT$17 billion (US$521.5 million; US$1 = NT$32.6) into the project. Called the APG (Asia Pacific Gateway) cable system, the system will link Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Taiwan, China, Japan, and South Korea, with a total length of around 8,000 km, the Sina News reported on May 25.

The APG system, which is expected to deliver a minimum bandwidth capacity of 4 Terabit per second upon completion, will leverage the advanced DWDM (Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing) technologies. Telecom operators participating in this project include Taiwan's Chunghwa Telecom, China Telecom and China Unicom, KT Corporation, NTT DoCoMo, PLDT (Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co.) , Vietnam Posts & Telecommunications Group, and Telekom Malaysia Bhd. Of the total investment, Chunghwa Telecom will earmark around NT$1.2-1.3 billion (US$36.8 - US$39.9 million) for the project, according again to the Commercial Times. Further details, however, were not yet disclosed.