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Impact

Faster internet, birth of a multi-billion dollar content delivery industry

MIT researchers used algorithms to build a content delivery system that eased internet congestion and launched a $10 billion company.

Today, Akamai routes 15-30 percent of the world's internet traffic across more than 200,000 servers in over 110 countries.


Today, Akamai routes 15-30 percent of the world's internet traffic across more than 200,000 servers
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March 27, 2018

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In the internet's early days, NSF-funded researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) developed algorithms to quickly deliver content via a geographically distributed network of servers, reducing internet congestion. The work launched a multi-billion-dollar industry, and two members of the research team founded Akamai Technologies.

As one MIT researcher noted in a 2000 final report about NSF's funding of this work: "Our work on replication and load balancing has led to the establishment of a startup company, Akamai Technologies, that uses our techniques in the real world. Besides having attracted over $40 million in venture funding, Akamai already has clients such as Yahoo and Apple paying to get improved performance in their web servers."

Today, Akamai is valued at $10 billion and routes 15-30 percent of the world's internet traffic.

NSF Directorate(s):
Directorate for Computer and Information Science and Engineering

Locations
Massachusetts

Related Awards
#9624239 CAREER: Randomization in Graph Optimization Problems
#8352349 Presidential Young Investigator Award (Computer Research)
#8914029 1st Annual ACM Symposium on Parallel Algorithms and Architectures in Sante Fe, New Mexico on June 18-21.

This NSF Impact is one of thousands of research outcomes made possible by NSF that help fuel the U.S. economy, enhance national security and sustain U.S. global leadership by advancing knowledge. You can search for more NSF Impacts at https://www.nsf.gov/impacts.

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