The growing Internet

Akamai carries cult status on the Internet. Founded in 1998 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it delivers content through its 84,000 servers across 72 countries. Akamai (a Hawaiian word for ‘smart’) accelerates applications and provides a reliable user experience.

David Kenny, a board member since 2007, became president in September 2010. He was a Bain & Co. consultant until 1996 when he founded Digitas, a digital agency. He sold it to Publicis Groupe in 2007, where he continued till the switch to Akamai. Early this year, he was also appointed to the board of Yahoo.

ON THE GLOBAL MARKETS: The market is driving Akamai’s global growth. We have companies around the world who rely on us for security and scalability. We understand the local usage, devices, and content that require us to be as much a human organisation as a technology one. The company has 1,700 locations across 35 countries, and partners who sell our products in other markets. Approximately 28% of Akamai’s revenue comes from the global market, but I want that to be 50%.

ON THE TECH BUBBLE: The current situation is different from what happened a decade ago. Akamai’s bandwidth doubles annually because more businesses use the Internet and cloud computing. It is better economics and less expensive. If there is a bubble to be burst, it may be an economic bubble because technology is actually creating more
efficient and useful solutions. In 2000, technology was built through Y2K. There was panic and a pullback. This time, the Internet is more ingrained in how businesses operate.

ON EXPANSION: Akamai’s recent acquisitions all contribute to overall growth. We look for startups that have developed part of a solution which can save us time in development. In 2005, we bought out Speedera Networks for its strong operations in Bangalore and their complementary networks. Then, the acquisition of Velocitude in 2010 saved us from figuring out how to adapt and deliver content to mobile solutions. Bear in mind that the Internet will be 100 times bigger in seven or eight years, which will be possible because of Akamai. I don’t mean that in an arrogant way, just mathematically. Our acquisitions cut the development cycle by two or three years. We are looking for acquisitions in Europe and Israel, and others with large engineering centres in India and China.

ON THE BANGALORE CENTRE: Bangalore is at the centre of making the Internet work. The network operations command centre which monitors server activity is the whole Internet. Every customer in the world touches Bangalore—130,000 websites across the world. One trillion interactions between people and websites happen every day from here. In the centre of India is this little operation that makes the Internet work. The aggregate scale is impressive.