There are several challenges with building a cloud type service in such locations. Connecting it to the rest of the world is one (backbone links, etc.). The oth

There are several challenges with building a cloud type service in such locations. Connecting it to the rest of the world is one (backbone links, etc.). The other is a very local problem: incumbent telcos who generally have the support of the government. These entities know you are playing in their territory and they will make you pay more when you're in their backyard. They'll be happy to peer with you out of their market, but they want you to pay up locally. It helps when there is competition for broadband and enterprise connectivity and those players work well, but it's the incumbents who want to get their beaks wet that result in having to pass a high cost to customers. This is super common in South America, Middle East and Asia. South Africa is a bit better now but before it used to be worse. Also this can extend to getting local/metro fiber if you want to launch multiple datacenters. Several countries won't even permit you to contract out building dark fiber in the metropolitan environment - they'll force you to buy much more expensive lit/wavelength transport so that you have to pay them to scale up at every 10G or 100G increment.