Finally got the chance to catch up with Anthony Citrano, the VP of Communications and Chief Evangelist for EdgeCast, and we had a productive conversation. For those who don’t know Anthony, let’s just say that what Jony Ive’s is to Apple, Anthony Citrano is to the CDN Industry. Anthony gave me a state of the union on the Defend Security offering, and the long term vision of EdgeCast. The call wasn’t what I expected, and I was “blown away”.
EdgeCast has transformed itself completely over the last three years. Not only are they going to disrupt the CDN industry at the enterprise level, but also disrupt the security appliance industry. EdgeCast is the #2 CDN, and has widened the gap significantly between itself and Limelight Networks (LLNW). While LLNW is likely to experience negative revenue growth this year, due to the loss of Netflix, EdgeCast is on a big upward trajectory, in terms of revenue and sustained monthly bandwidth utilization. There is no more debate as to who is #2 CDN. Below are some key takeaways from the call. In the coming days, I’ll discuss each takeaway more in depth.
EdgeCast Reinvigorated
- EdgeCast is a now a direct threat to Akamai, unlike any other CDN in the past, including LLNW
- EdgeCast is likely to match Akamai’s scale in 5 years or less
- EdgeCast has caught up to Akamai in the depth of its feature set
- EdgeCast is growing threat to F5 Networks, and their Web Application Firewall / WAN Optimization hardware appliances
- F5 Networks is in for a rude awakening, and their acquisition of Defense.net might be a little too late, and not enough to stem the business risk they face in the years to come