Asian cable accord sought

Asian cable accord sought

TOKYO (Kyodo): KDD has filed for permission to join with telecommunications firms in 27 other countries to build an underwater fiber-optics communication cable system, stretching some 12,000 kilometers in the Asia-Pacific region, the Japanese international telecommunications giant said.

After getting a permit from Posts and Telecommunications Minister Katsuyuki Hikasa, KDD and 47 other companies will sign the agreement in a ceremony on June 30 in Yokohama.

The planned cable, named Asia Pacific Cable Network (APCN), will serve as part of an international information highway in the upcoming multimedia era, KDD officials said.

The cable will connect 10 nations and territories in the Asia- western Pacific region -- Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia and Australia.

APCN will have a total capacity of five gigabits per second, equivalent to 60,480 circuits, in 64 kilobit per second terms. The project is estimated to cost US$560 million, of which about 10 percent will be provided by KDD to acquire 7,890 circuits, KDD said.