What began as a micro-loan from a billionaire, a moving van, and the name P19, now intends to push into the U.S. and rival Amazon.com Inc.’s $12-billion-plus cloud business.
The name stands for Paris and its 19th district, where 42-year-old Octave Klaba set up his first data center after borrowing money from fellow entrepreneur and one of France’s richest people, Xavier Niel, and moving equipment back and forth from hometown Roubaix in the north of France.