Africa needs servers: Mobile penetration has occurred, but where’s the infrastructure?

Emerging markets easily play one of the most important roles in the tech community — holding promise for growth and innovation, while also serving as a completely new demographic for existing tech giants and startups alike. This is exactly why keeping tabs on these markets is essential, even if you’re usually heads down focused on The Valley, Tel Aviv and NYC.

On that note, The Pingdom blog is reporting that only 0.27% of the world’s top 1 million sites are hosted in Africa, noting that “with its over 1 billion people, [Africa] has reached a 13.5% Internet penetration rate, and there are plenty of big websites about the continent. But where are those sites hosted?”

Right now, Pingdom found that 34 countries in Africa host one or more sites in the top 1 million, but these countries collectively host a slim 2,670 sites. Here’s a list of the top sites hosted in Africa (note the Alexa ratings):

As Internet usage in Africa continues to rise, there will need to be some serious infrastructure development for the self-contained economy to thrive. It’s one of many opportunities for tech growth in this region, and it’ll have an interesting impact on the rest of the world: greater competition for international Web hosts, increasing overall competition through the impending burst of Africa-made sites and an new generation of talent.

All in all, keep your eyes open on this space, as things are happening (particularly in South Africa and Egypt), just not all at once.