Access to broadband internet is the new access to ports, rail, and electricity

In the 21st century, a small business in Kansas City, Missouri, has at least one very important thing in common with a small business in Seoul, Korea: Both have access to ultra high-speed internet—Kansas City via Google Fiber and Seoul on account of its government championing the rollout of fiber optic internet for over a decade.

That’s one way to look at Akamai’s quarterly “state of the internet” report, in which the content serving company samples requests to its own servers to reveal internet connectivity speeds all over the world.

As Daniel Ek, CEO of Spotify, emphasized to me the last time we spoke, the one reason a country as small as Sweden has a disproportionate share of successful internet startups is that Swedish teenagers grow up taking gigabit internet connections for granted. And it’s not just traditional web startups and IT giants that need fast internet connectivity. Arguably, as businesses move more functions to the cloud and mobile becomes increasingly important, everyone needs fast internet connectivity. Whether you’re a manufacturer who has to conduct remote meetings with suppliers in distant countries or a sales department that requires its cloud-based customer relations management software to be fast and responsive, fast broadband internet is now a core infrastructure requirement not unlike reliable transportation and energy.