State-run Vietnamese telecom giant VNPT has taken another step in its plan to expand into global markets with the inauguration of a maiden representative office managed by its international unit, VNPT International, in Myanmar on Wednesday.

VNPT International also signed memoranda of understanding on business cooperation and investment with several local businesses, according to an announcement on the VNPT website the same day.

VNPT, fully known as the Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group, said the representative office in Yangon will connect the company with its customers and partners in Myanmar.

The former capital of Myanmar, Yangon is the country's largest city, as well as its most important commercial center, with a population of over five million.

During the office inauguration ceremony, VNPT International signed cooperation memoranda with several Myanmarese firms, including A1 Construction Co. Ltd, Terabit Wave, Elite Telecom Public Company Limited, and Fortune International.

As of the end of 2012, only 5.4 million out of 60 million, or 9 percent of the Myanmarese people, used mobile phones, VNPT says on its website. The rate was 100 percent in Thailand, 70 percent in Cambodia, and 87 percent in Laos, the telecom group added.

Myanmar’s government hopes to increase the number of mobile phone users to 75-80 percent of the population between 2015 and 2016, creating opportunities for VNPT to penetrate deeper into what it deems “a potential and lucrative telecom market,” the Vietnamese firm said.

VNPT began studying investment chances in Myanmar in 2011 and eventually partnered with several local businesses.