Akamai is the 800 pound gorilla in the land of giants. The global content delivery ecosystem is too vital for any one company to dominate. Just a few years back, none of these giants had a CDN. Eventually, they came to the understanding that controlling the delivery of content is as vital as the pharmaceutical companies controlling the drug routes 🙂
Fortunately, the global content delivery industry is growing big enough for many to enjoy its fruits. Akamai’s latest earnings of $570M in Q2 2015 is evidence of this trend. Apple is so large that they will always have to use multi-CDNs and carriers. Amazon and Level 3 are doing quite well operating their own self sustaining CDNs. Verizon is still in the midst of figuring things out, in regards to its CDN ambitions. Netflix is going to take over the world of streaming media. And Comcast has quite a ways to go before they catch up to the likes of Level 3.
Would Amazon and Akamai Join Forces
From the giants above, who would be the best fit for joining forces with Akamai? That would be Amazon, and at $250B market cap, they can afford it. It will never happen, but what if it did? Culturally, it would be like a skater and preppy joining forces. In terms of CDN market share, this dynamic dual would dominate the world of content delivery. Amazon would work on the low end of the market, and Akamai on the high end, and that’s whats called a scary combo.