On the Edge: An Interview with Akamai's George Conrades

Akamai Technologies is attracting investors, employees, partners, and customers like a supercharged magnet. The Cambridge, Massachusetts, company is transforming the way the Internet works, and everybody, it seems, wants to be "Akamaized." But will the attraction last? Will the company meet the challenges of explosive growth? Will it maintain its technological edge? Will it fulfill the giddy expectations of investors? Much of that depends on the performance of George Conrades, Akamai's chairman and CEO. In this interview, Conrades explains how Akamai pushes Web content and services closer to end users through the use of distributed servers and proprietary software. He shares the challenges and thrills of working at Internet speed--forging partnerships with site operators, ISPs, and application providers; setting and achieving short-term business goals while preserving the company's intellectually combative corporate culture; and maintaining a customer focus. Conrades discusses the company's "virtuous circle" business model--better technology attracts more content providers, which begets more ISP participation, which begets better technology--and reveals the strategies and processes Akamai uses to keep that circle spinning. He discusses his own role as an absorber of uncertainty: by taking on the inevitable risks of competing in the networked economy, he frees up the rest of company to act. Conrades, who's been in business long enough to see the industrial era give way to the Internet era, says the new economy is all about "speed and scale." But it's also about risk-taking, innovation, and teamwork. Bureaucratic CEOs need not apply.

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