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Akamai controls the flow
By BETH SCHULTZ
 Hear the words "flash flood," and you'll likely envision muddied, churning waters raging out of control, wiping deep swatches across the landscape and leaving havoc in their wake.
 The words "flash crowd" don't have quite the same effect - but start-up Akamai Technologies has launched a business around the belief that if one hits an unprepared Web site, the devastation could be just as dramatic for the business owner.
By Akamai's definition, a flash crowd happens when a Web site experiences an intense traffic spike correlating to an event. One infamous example is the glut of concerned citizens pounding the U.S. House of Representatives site when it posted the Starr Report.
A company can usually sense when something it plans on posting on the Web is going to draw a crowd, but it has no way to predict the onslaught's volume. That's where Akamai steps in, says David Goodtree, the company's newly named vice president of marketing.
Akamai has developed a patent-pending technology for managing traffic loads across multiple networks. Its service, called FreeFlow, pushes content as close to the user as possible by distributing it across a network of Akamai servers.
"A user might typically be one, two or three networks away from the content. With FreeFlow, if an ISP customer looks down the physical wire, the first thing he should see in the point of presence is our server," Goodtree says.
Toward that end, Akamai already has deployed 500 servers on 10 networks around the globe. By year-end, it will have 1,000 servers on 20 networks. More will follow, as quickly as the company can get them up, Goodtree says.
Akamai put FreeFlow through the wringer in beta tests involving 10 undisclosed Web content providers. During the trial, FreeFlow handled live traffic, including several flash crowds, with "aplomb," Goodtree says, noting that the beta traffic taxed only 1% of Akamai's network and that each beta user has decided to become a paying customer.
Akamai's prospects look great, says Todd Dagres, general partner at Battery Ventures, a venture capital firm in Wellesley, Mass.
"It is helping satisfy a very clear need relative to how Web-centric companies deliver content over the Internet," he says.
What's more, Akamai has an impressive management team behind it, Dagres adds. The team is led by George Conrades, who became chairman and CEO earlier this month. In various corporate lives, Conrades launched IBM's services business, led the commercialization of BBN's research and development business, and then oversaw the integration of GTE's Internet and data communications activities following the BBN acquisition.
Akamai has $8 million in initial funding, led by Battery Ventures and Polaris Venture Partners. The company is closing its second round of financing this month, so "it will have a large war chest," Dagres says.
With such backing, Akamai's sure to be more than just a flash in the pan.
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