Ask PG: Why do you think Africa cannot produce global scale start ups?

I think the main reasons Africa hasn't produced global scale startups is that they (global scale startups) are so rare you really need everything to be in your favor AND to have a lot of luck for a startup to become a global success.

What unique advantage does being from Africa give you? I'm assuming you are clever and lucky - but there are a lot of clever, lucky people around who also have access to friends with huge amounts of capital (eg, Silicon Valley) or cheap programming talent (Bangalore) or a positive start-up culture (Israel) or government backing (endless incubators around the world).

Some advantages I could see being in Africa (and I'm hardly an expert!):

There appear to be a large number of state-run monopoly businesses that could be undercut by a cheaper, faster startup. My understanding is that this is how a lot of the successful African telecom businesses got their start. That's a good advantage, because state monopolies are very slow to react.

Cheap natural resources. I'm from Australia, and a large amount of custom software development here is related to what is essentially counting rocks being pulled out of the ground or wool of sheep (etc etc) and making sure it does to the correct places. I'd expect it is the same in Africa, and there maybe local opportunities there that give you a big advantage.

Anyway - I don't know, but I am really interested. Why would PG be interested in African startups? What advantage do they have that would make them worth investing in?

I think the asker is making the classic error of "the exception does not invalidate the rule". Is it possible to do such a thing out of Africa/Nigeria? Probably. Would it be much harder to do so than in many other more developed/western countries? Most definitely. But this doesn't mean an entrepreneur or investor should be dissuaded from doing such a thing, especially if you are a native of such a country. Instead, probably the more that native residents of any country try to build something new and innovative and bootstrap a new empire, the better -- for everybody concerned.

I can't find any professional or academic links to or from this paper. Do you have any more resources?

Specifically, I'm interested in the sources for their data. This was a fascinating paper.

Did you know?

Mark Shuttleworth and Elon Musk come from South Africa.

First of all I would apologise for not responding since. I foolishly forgot to remove my noprocast setting so I was essentially locked out of hacker news while this has been up.

I would like to point out that I worded my question poorly. I do not agree Nigeria/Africa cannot create world class startups. I meant to say like RobFitz pointed out below: Why does PG and others like him capable of change write off a whole continent without trying.

Nevertheless, you guys as usual have got an amazing discussion going. Thank you!

I fully understand the points a lot of you have raised and it boils down to two things.

1: Lack of Trust 2: Lack of infrastructure (Legal, Human resources, Power, e.t.c)

In my book, I thought an identifiable problem breeds opportunity. We have a market western countries are unwilling to serve because the perceived risk outweighs the perceived opportunity. America had the highest fraud but is not blacklisted because the opportunity outweighs the risk and I believe it is the same for Nigeria/Africa. I believe there is an opportunity for our local companies to act as local representatives of existing global companies and combine local knowledge with international skill to create businesses back in Nigeria/Africa.

I do not think location matters in creating a product that has potential as anyone can launch a Rapportive from anywhere in the world. Of course it matters when scaling it.

From what I have seen, our greatest challenge stems from the fact that our people are trying to succeed against the odds. We do not have access to mentors or education that will help us tackle these problems so we are left at a very bad advantage. We struggle to have belief on ourselves because people we look up to have written us off. We have a long rough road ahead and we will trudge on. one day we will succeed. All I ask is for people like PG (who still hasn't responded) and HN'ers to have a little faith in us. Believe me, it helps.