Akamai has decided to end its content delivery network services in China, but not because it’s finding it hard to do business in the Middle Kingdom. It recently published a letter to customers and partners that opens by reminding them the company has a “commitment to providing world-class delivery and security solutions” – and must therefore inform them that “Effective June 30, 2026, all China CDN services will reach their decommission date.
” Customers are offered a choice: do nothing and then be moved to an Akamai CDN located outside China, or use similar services from Chinese companies Tencent Cloud and Wangsu Science & Technology. The letter, however, warns that “All current China CDN customers must complete the transition to our Partners’ solution by June 30, 2026, to maintain uninterrupted service.” So maybe that cutover to offshore services won’t be so easy. Akamai can already help with migration to Tencent Cloud’s services and is working on similar offerings for Wangsu. China is a tricky place to do business for foreign companies, who are nearly always required to operate through local partners and can sometimes find authorities asking very pointed questions about how their products and technologies. Some tech vendors have even established centers at which they conduct very detailed demos of their wares to Chinese authorities, ostensibly to reassure them they don’t represent security threats. Some tech vendors are therefore leery of working in China, as they fear the country’s requirements represent an unwelcome risk of IP leakage. China again signals desire to shape global IPv6 standards That appears not to be the case for Akamai, which told us that “Like any business, we constantly evaluate our offerings in each market to best address our customers' needs” and that it remains committed to China