Akamai Technologies, Inc. (AKAM) Business Profile

What it does

Akamai helps businesses build, secure and deliver applications and digital experiences. It sells cybersecurity, cloud computing and content delivery services to enterprises and government agencies. Founded in 1998 and headquartered in Cambridge, the company is led by chief executive F. Thomson Leighton.

Its security products help protect websites, applications, networks and users. They include defenses against attacks that overwhelm services with traffic, tools that identify malicious automated activity, and products that help businesses find and protect application programming interfaces, or APIs. Akamai also offers tools designed to limit an attacker’s movement within a network and to protect AI applications.

Its cloud computing services provide computing, storage and networking capacity for applications. Customers can distribute workloads across Akamai’s infrastructure, including locations closer to end users and devices. Akamai also offers AI inference services, which run trained models to produce responses or make predictions.

Delivery services help businesses move content and software across the internet. They include website and application performance tools, video streaming, game and software delivery, and monitoring. Akamai also provides professional services, technical support and managed security services.

The company’s infrastructure combines core and distributed computing sites with edge locations, which place computing and delivery resources closer to users. As of December 31, 2025, its network included more than 4,300 edge points-of-presence in over 130 countries and was integrated with roughly 1,200 network partners.

How it makes money

Akamai primarily earns revenue by selling services under customer contracts with terms of one year or longer. Those agreements cover security, delivery, cloud computing and professional services. Renewals, renewal prices, additional products sold to customers, cloud usage and the amount of traffic carried on the network all affect revenue.

Revenue was $4.2 billion in FY2025 and $1.122 billion in Q3 2026.

Security is the largest portion of revenue. Its products include application and API protection, bot management, network segmentation and security services. Customers can also purchase premium and managed services, such as security traffic monitoring, technical reviews and emergency support.

Cloud computing includes infrastructure services and other cloud applications. The infrastructure offering sells compute capacity through virtual machines, managed Kubernetes, storage and networking. Akamai also offers serverless, pay-per-use inference or dedicated deployments for its AI inference service. Large customers can make multi-year cloud infrastructure commitments; the company begins billing as equipment is installed, tested and made available for use.

Delivery revenue comes from services that move content, applications and software over the internet. Customer traffic and the prices negotiated at renewal affect that revenue. Some delivery and security customers have paid lower prices at renewal in recent years because of competition. Akamai has sought to offset some of that pressure by selling additional solutions to existing customers.

In Q3 2026, security revenue was $622 million, Cloud Infrastructure Services revenue was $109 million, and delivery and other cloud applications revenue was $391 million. The company also provides support for customers integrating, configuring and managing its offerings.

Customers and how it sells

Akamai serves enterprises across industries as well as government agencies. Named customers include Adobe, Airbnb, eBay, Electronic Arts, Honda, Marriott, Spotify and Ubisoft. Its public-sector customers include the U.S. Department of Defense and the U.S. Department of the Treasury. No customer accounted for 10% or more of total revenue in each of 2025, 2024 and 2023.

The company sells directly through its field sales and services organization and through channel partners. Its partners include resellers, system integrators, technology distributors, referral partners and marketplaces. Sales and services staff work across the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific.

In FY2025, U.S. revenue was $2.1 billion, or 50.8% of total revenue. International revenue was $2.1 billion, or 49.2%. Akamai reports in U.S. dollars, so exchange-rate changes affect its reported international revenue.

In 2026, Akamai signed an $11.6 billion commitment over seven years with Anthropic to support its CPU workloads. The company had contracted for the data-center space and power required to deliver that contract. Separately, revenue had begun from two of its first three major cloud infrastructure contracts.

Suppliers and costs

Akamai relies on network partners, bandwidth providers, data-center space and power, server hardware and third-party services to operate its platform. Its compute platform also uses graphics processing units from NVIDIA. The company faces competition for servers, memory, data-center capacity and power; larger cloud competitors can have priority access to those resources.

Payroll and related costs, including stock-based compensation, are Akamai’s largest expense. Bandwidth and co-location costs, including energy used to power the network, are significant direct costs. Building and supporting the network adds maintenance, services and partner-program costs, while investment in network equipment contributes depreciation expense.

Akamai has entered into longer-term leases for compute locations and can incur co-location costs before the locations are fully used. It has also experienced higher server and memory costs as it builds out cloud computing capacity. The company expects those increases to add to future capital expenditure and depreciation.

For its Anthropic contract, Akamai had secured all required space and power and approximately 70% of the necessary hardware and other components. The contract includes a pricing adjustment mechanism intended to address changes in the cost of components not yet ordered.

Competitive position

Akamai competes in security, cloud computing and internet delivery. Its rivals include providers of content delivery and hosting, streaming services, hardware and software security products, and cloud platforms. Customers can also build or purchase their own technology rather than use a third-party provider. Akamai expects its cloud services to compete increasingly with large hyperscale cloud providers.

No specific competitor is named as such in the available company material. Competition turns on factors including performance, reliability, network distribution, security, service, ease of use and price. Some competitors have greater resources, broader product portfolios and more established relationships, while smaller rivals can offer lower-priced products or respond quickly to changes in customer needs.

Our reading: Akamai’s distributed network is a meaningful competitive asset because it places services near users and gives the company visibility into traffic and attack patterns. Its value is tested by competitors that can expand their own networks and secure scarce infrastructure resources.

Our reading: The combination of security, delivery and compute gives Akamai a basis for selling additional services to existing customers, but price pressure at renewals limits how much that breadth protects revenue. Its patents and proprietary technology also support its position, although the company must keep developing products as security threats and customer requirements change.

Growth opportunities

Akamai is investing in security and cloud computing, including its distributed compute platform and AI infrastructure. Security growth has been led by application protection and network segmentation, while cloud growth has benefited from enhanced compute services and Cloud Infrastructure Services. The company also seeks to sell additional products to existing customers across its security, delivery and compute portfolios.

In Q3 2026, security revenue grew 9% year-over-year as reported, while Cloud Infrastructure Services revenue grew 34% year-over-year as reported. Delivery and other cloud applications revenue declined 3% year-over-year as reported. Akamai has also added AI services that let enterprises build and tune models using their own data and run AI agents within defined boundaries.

Akamai signed more than $14 billion of multi-year Cloud Infrastructure Services commitments in 2026, including the Anthropic agreement. The company expects Cloud Infrastructure Services revenue of $1.1 to $1.3 billion in 2027 and expects total company revenue to surpass $7 billion in 2028. The latter expectation excludes revenue from additional orders under the $9 billion option related to Anthropic.

Akamai has begun recognizing revenue from two major cloud contracts, but the build-out requires equipment and data-center capacity. Supply-chain and third-party data-center delays affected two deals; Akamai expects approximately $30 million of revenue to shift from Q4 into 2027 and says the delays do not reduce total revenue over the contract periods.

Structural risks

• Delivery pressure: Competition, lower prices and changes in content traffic have affected delivery revenue. Customers can reduce spending, move traffic among providers or develop their own capabilities, reducing traffic on Akamai’s network.
• Cloud execution and spending: Building cloud capacity requires significant investment and depends on obtaining co-location facilities and server hardware. Costs may be incurred before sites are fully used, and new services may not attract enough customers or revenue.
• Competition and security innovation: Larger providers can bundle broader services, offer lower prices and obtain priority access to infrastructure. Akamai must develop or acquire security products that respond to changing threats and remain competitive at renewal.
• Service failures and cyberattacks: Software defects, outages or security incidents can lead to lost customers, service credits, contract terminations, liability and reputational damage. Attacks can also target Akamai’s suppliers and other third parties.
• Global and regulatory exposure: Economic and geopolitical conditions can disrupt operations and supply chains or cause customers to delay spending. Privacy, data localization, cybersecurity and other evolving rules can increase compliance costs or constrain how Akamai uses data and provides services.
• Contract deployment timing: Supply-chain and third-party data-center delays have already deferred revenue on cloud deals. Akamai says timing shifts do not change total contract revenue, but equipment and locations must still be delivered and made ready for customer use.

Bottom line

Our reading

Akamai combines recurring enterprise security and delivery services with a growing, infrastructure-intensive cloud business. Its distributed network and existing customer relationships support cross-selling, while delivery pricing and traffic remain under pressure. Large cloud commitments provide a contracted path for expansion, but realizing that revenue depends on deploying equipment and data-center capacity as costs arrive ahead of some usage.