Akamai

Overview

Akamai has, almost literally, been at the center of the explosion of the Internet with their solutions to help improve the performance of everything from accessing email, watching a video, or using a web-based application. With the ascendancy of cloud computing, the requirements placed on the Internet backbone will grow exponentially. Performance, reliability and security issues are critical factors that could damper wider adoption of cloud computing - especially when it comes to enterprise businesses and government organizations.

Akamai occupies an interesting (and enviable) place when it comes to the Internet and the convergence of cloud computing. Optimization issues will be a constant as growth in the utilization of cloud-based services increase along with the continued growth of the web. In order to overcome these performance issues, some of which are inherent in the very fabric that makes up the Internet, companies of all types (i.e. not just service providers) will look for ways to overcome these limitations.

And that's where Akamai fits in: their solutions help remove the "inefficiencies in application, transport, and routing layer protocols," while improving the "security and continuity of cloud services." So, whether one is a consumer of cloud-based services - whether via a public cloud, private cloud or both - or a provider of such services, Akamai helps optimize the cloud for all types of users and providers.

Value Proposition

Akamai claims their Web Application Performance solutions improve application response times up to 5x; result in an average ROI over 500% in just over two months; improve application availability by eliminating Internet bottlenecks; and help reduce capital and operational expenses by and reduce bandwidth needs.

Akamai's solutions also help "SaaS providers improve the performance, reliability and availability of their on-demand software applications along with the cost and scalability benefits associated with a managed service."

Their NetStorage solution provides on-demand storage to improve capacity and help reduce the cost associated with storing and managing content.

Products & Services

• Akamai EdgePlatform is the world's largest distributed network comprised of more than 56,000 servers in over 1,000 networks, across 70 countries. It's designed to overcome the inefficiencies of the Internet, while improving the overall security and continuity of cloud-based services.
• Akamai Application Performance Services includes two primary solutions to improve the performance of cloud computing solutions: Web Application Accelerator improves the scalability and reliability of cloud-based services through a variety of transport, route optimization and caching techniques, and provides on-demand capacity without investing in additional resources; and IP Application Accelerator "provides an optimized architecture for delivering all classes of applications to the extended enterprise, ensuring increased application performance and availability for remote wireline and wireless users."
• Akamai NetStorage provides storage on-demand and works by allowing users to upload content to a specific directory in the Akamai network, replicate it, and store copies at multiple locations around the globe. Akamai then distributes it in the most efficient manner possible, keeping it close to end-users, to improve delivery and reliability.