Regulations & Governance: Similarly, things such as rule of law, conscientious regulation, political stability, and the presence or absence of civil freedoms can help gauge the volatility or dependability of a local operating environment.

Markets on the Rise

Having laid out the key foundational factors to consider in communications market hub development generally, let’s dive into some real examples. Here are five cities to watch, and why they should be on your radar in 2025, based on the nine core factors we determined are crucial to assessing market connectivity.

Kuala Lumpur

Thanks to a confluence of network, data center, and cloud developments, Kuala Lumpur is the world's fastest-growing city for near-future connectivity infrastructure growth.

Kuala Lumpur benefits from its proximity to Singapore — one of the world's strongest interconnection hubs — by capitalizing on growth where Singapore faces space and power constraints. Big names like Google, AWS, and Microsoft are building new cloud regions here. Meanwhile, Kuala Lumpur draws major players like STT, Vantage, and EdgeConneX for data center expansion. Fueling local competitiveness on the network side, Kuala Lumpur also offers more affordable IP transit than other Southeast Asian hubs.

Kuala Lumpur's lack of clean energy options is its biggest weakness. For now, fossil fuel supply enables growth where neighboring Singapore is hamstrung, but lack of sustainable energy prospects hampers Kuala Lumpur’s potential.

Frankfurt

Despite its status as the world's number one most connected hub as of Q4 2024, Frankfurt also ranks as the third-fastest growing market globally. That may come as a surprise, particularly when considering the fact that Germany’s data center industry is wrestling with increasingly stringent sustainability regulations. But demand here is such that tighter regulation and the high cost of doing business are not dampening demand. At least 17 data centers are currently under construction here — more than any other European city. Frankfurt is also home to the world's largest data center-neutral IX, DE-CIX, and the strongest peering ecosystem (both by the number of IX platforms present and the number of ASNs connected). Along with tremendous international internet capacity (223.5 Tbps), Frankfurt boasts an impressive number of international cities with direct international connections (more than 150) and numerous carrier and WAN service providers.

Vienna

Vienna is making moves, eclipsing Stockholm to become Europe's sixth-largest international internet hub, with 62.5 Tbps of capacity. Vienna is now the third fastest-growing connectivity market in Europe, with cloud regions from AWS, Google, and Microsoft in active development. Although it has a relatively small data center market, Vienna has a top-ten European peering market with multiple exchanges and a high concentration of international ASNs (86 percent) at local IXs.

Berlin

In contrast, Berlin — Europe's fourth fastest-growing connectivity market — has a booming data center scene. Despite increased regulatory and energy constraints, Berlin has more data centers in the works than any European city except Frankfurt. Critically, Berlin boasts more near-term prospects for clean power development than Frankfurt. Despite Berlin's momentum in other areas, however, its peering, cloud, and network ecosystems are less developed than those of larger hubs.

Santiago de Querétaro

Santiago de Querétaro, Mexico is leading the charge in Latin America as the region's fastest-growing hub. Microsoft, Google, and AWS are all setting up shop, while operators like Ascenty, Scala, and ODATA have data centers in the pipeline. Since 2020, the city has seen its data center footprint grow at an impressive 16 percent annually, second only to Santiago, Chile. However, like Kuala Lumpur, Santiago de Querétaro faces challenges with clean energy availability.

What Does This All Mean?

Other markets warrant attention as well. But in these five we have solid examples of a confluence of factors working together to make hubs stronger — network growth moving with cloud, data center, IX, and other components. Remember, network infrastructure doesn’t develop in a vacuum. The markets we’ve flagged for growth have the right alchemy right now. But when the right network and broader economic requirements are met, any hub can flourish.