Cities have always played a major role in bringing people and business together. That was the case centuries ago in the open-air markets that flourished in places like Athens and Rome.
And it’s still true today in our interconnected, online world.
If you’re a company with a SaaS offering, an online game, an AI-inference model—or any application that demands super-reliable performance and ultra-low latency—you’re likely going to host that application in an urban center with a highly developed digital infrastructure. That’s going to give you the best chance of reaching as large a target audience as possible.
Cities know this. That’s why—alongside highways and mass transit systems—massive investments in digital urban infrastructures are the name of the game today.
How Singapore showed the way
Take Singapore for example. Recognizing the importance of a robust, reliable digital infrastructure, Singapore took action over a decade ago to establish the Next Generation Nationwide Broadband Network (NGNBN), delivering ultra-high-speed fiber connectivity. And that was just the start. The government kept promoting digital transformation through initiatives like its “Smart Nation” program and making Singapore one of the first countries in the region to roll out a nationwide 5G network. And it’s a major hub for undersea cables, connecting it to key markets globally and providing the backbone for its robust internet infrastructure.
All of this has made Singapore a digital leader. The consulting firm TeleGeography ranks cities around the world using criteria such as data center power, population and IP transit price. Its goal is to answer questions such as “What is the best-connected hub in a region/country?” or “Which cities are emerging as new hubs?”
Based on this evaluation, the firm declared Singapore the fifth most connected city in the world in its 2024Q4 ranking. That puts Singapore in league with Frankfurt, London and Amsterdam. And it’s rivaled in Asia only by Tokyo, which has more than six times the population.
Having seen Singapore’s success, other cities in Southeast Asia are clamoring to be next.
Rising star: Kuala Lumpur
Topping the list of cities on the connectivity fast track is Malaysia’s capital city, Kuala Lumpur. Situated at the confluence of the Gombak and Klang Rivers and close to Port Klang, Kuala Lumpur has long benefited from its strategic position, first for trading tin and rubber and then in the 20th century as a financial center. Today, this location has a very different advantage: it puts the city within a 5,000-kilometer radius—short enough to achieve an acceptable latency of 50 milliseconds—of nearly 600 million consumers across the rest of Malaysia and Singapore as well as Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines.
Like Singapore, Kuala Lumpur has invested heavily in infrastructure. More than three decades ago in 1996, the Malaysian government launched the Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC). This effort sent a clear signal that Kuala Lumpur was serious about welcoming leading tech multinationals such as Microsoft and IBM, while also nurturing a local ecosystem of startups and IT businesses.
The tech friendly tradition in Kuala Lumpur continues today. In 2024, both Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud announced their intentions to invest more than $8 billion establishing dedicated cloud regions in Kuala Lumpur. The city is also seeing robust growth in data centers.
Rivals to Kuala Lumpur
However, while Kuala Lumpur sprints ahead in connectivity, it also looks nervously over its shoulder at other nearby rivals:
Bangkok: Like other cities on TeleGeography’s list, it is leveraging a government initiative (Thailand 4.0) and a location that makes it an ideal hub for connecting to neighboring economies like Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar.
Jakarta: Indonesia’s capital city is following the playbook of making major infrastructure investment. And the population of consumers that can be reached in 50 milliseconds is comparable to that of Kuala Lumpur.
Manila: Manila’s cost-effectiveness, skilled workforce, and government support make it a competitive alternative to more established digital hubs in Asia.
The Need for a Partner
While all of these cities are definitely tech friendly, doing business does pose challenges, with compliance at the top of the list. It takes a while to navigate the intricacies of data protection statutes and restrictions on cross-border data transfers. Partnering with local providers who know the ropes is essential—it’s a key reason many companies turn to providers such as Zenlayer.
Getting as close as possible to large populations. Making it easy to deploy edge computing nodes. Ensuring consistent, reliable, low-latency performance. These are the challenges facing providers of digital services today. And these challenges are only going to increase as AI inference engines play a greater role.
Singapore showed that these challenges can be met by leveraging a strategic location and highly targeted infrastructure investments. Now Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Jakarta and Manila are rising fast to show they have what it takes to be the next Singapore.
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