The Emerging 20 Nations

A little over one year ago, almost 99% of the 13 million servers hooked to the Internet were distributed throughout North America, Western Europe and Asia, primarily Japan. Among the 4 billion inhabitants that make up the rest of the world, only 1% of all internet hosts were distributed to them, according to the International Telecommunications Union. This translates into a plethora of untouched opportunities for expanding the internet into countries that lie abroad. Inter@ctive Week has coined the term The Emerging 20 to distinguish those countries which may prove to be the most lucrative markets going into the 21st century. Most of the Emerging 20 are made up of Latin American, Asian and Eastern European countries and all share two qualities that make them extremely attractive to U.S. equipment providers: All are in their technological beginnings and all are headed by governments that realize the vital need for advanced communications to sustain an economy in the new Internet frontier. The most sought after foreign market for almost every Internet company is China. With a population of 1.2 billion, 4.6 of whom own telephones, a 5% increase in telephones would mean about a 60 million increase in numbers. The government in China also plans to privatize much of the state owned and operated utilities. After Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America, the next major market likely to be opened is sub-Saharan Africa. [IC_ARTICLE_OBJECT [SHOW IC_Article_ID] “table1”]

Source: Inter@ctive Week Date: September 29, 1997