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Akamai To Acquire Linode
Looks like the number is around $900 million USD.
Original press release: https://www.akamai.com/newsroom/press-release/akamai-to-acquire-linode
Comments
By now I imagine Linode is a pretty good buy. It seems like it wasn't all that long ago that under the hood a lot of how they operated matched small providers here, renting a lot and owning little. But after some major setbacks, I have to imagine that they've stepped up and actually built something fitting of their size.
Take your popcorn and watch for upcoming ddos from big sharks, like they did to yahoo, for reducing price in many times. Sad, but linode pretty solid guys... I mean they did pretty nice business for decades...
I hope everything will be smooth, but akamai has no mercy, they are damn super rough guys
My take: Vultr is next.
900 million ticket price 🎟
Or at
9 times anticipated revenue. Not to mention Tax credits for 15 years, equivalent of NPV of 120 million dollars today…
Seems like acquisition for bookkeeping than for marketing or strategic fit.
Good exit for Linode founders though.
Added later:
@raindog308 I read your fairly well covered post on LEB after I published mine here. I I concur: deal does not make sense from many angles, but certainly could be one way to save on taxes. And to take the Vultr logic further.. Upcloud also comes to mind.
And in addition to revenue per employee, profitability per node would also come into play when the axe falls.
Almost a big B. Wow.
Linode seemed to have killed it at getting their name out. There always seemed to be free swag and credits at any hackathon or developer conference I went to. Everyone's projects were hosted on there it seemed.
Aye, too much to read tonight
Tbh, cheaper than I thought. Always thought of Linode as at least a $1bn company. After all, DigitalOcean is like $6.5bn.
linode is good vps
the next step:
cloudflare to buy digitalocean
dedipath to buy vultr
how about this: Hetzner buy BMW to make cheap reliable cars to compete with Toyota
Oh my Akamai,
Buys good old Linode.
Do they still running on cold fusion? I rememmber those nasty hacks
. Hackers running months with total root access all over their panel.
Non-the-less, perfect exit. And akamai news coverage - something to look for. I hope vultr will hold.
Vultr already trying the big evil corporation card to get there customers: https://www.vultr.com/news/Congratulations-Linode.-Where-do-you-go-from-here/
Vultr even dedicated a $150 voucher to the acquisition
I wonder if they will be offering any CDN-type products on linode soon then.
Or if Akamai wants to stick 100% with their big enterprise only sales strategy.
Speaking about vultures
. I love those corp battles: dirty, all hands in, corrupt, no shame and straight up disgusting. The drama.
epic
Those guys tend to overpay more, and bigger profit margins is better for business
Yes.
Linode will now go from the affordable small provider to one for enterprise customers..along with an appropriate and large cost increase.
I can already feel the price increases
Ou yea, they will put the great filter of price and will start to remove those pesky cheapskates. Maybe then I will remove blocks for Linode ASN.
I really hope that you are wrong. Among DO, Vultr and Linode, Vultr has been the one I have always liked the most in terms of features and performance. They have also been very friendly. I remember them taking a big DDoS hit for us once and refusing to null route. They tried to hold up until eventually some locations started melting down and a null became the only option. Great service.
Does Vultr still use RAID-0 for their cloud servers?
Relative to how things are valued recently, Akamai is getting a decent bargain.
I hope they won't confiscate my $12 leftover credit (last used 3.5 years ago).
Sad to see one of the few independent players gone, but the trend in the industry is clear.
It seems cheap to me, given their size and the progress they made in deploying their own infrastructure and staying competitive.
I am not betting on Vultr being the next, one would think that Constant is better positioned to stay independent, even if only in the hopes of still being able to grow a lot by themselves. But we will see.
As a business owner, what you (I mean all the business owners here) would prefer:
keep running company like Linode or rather put $900M in your pocket? Who would ever bother selling VPSes if they could afford not to?
Business created to earn money. Selling out to a bigger shark is the ultimate form of earning. The final stage. With 900 Mil you are free. Free to live without any worries except your health and your family.