In live streaming, speed and monetization are everything. With their latest collaboration, Akamai and Harmonic are making both easier than ever. Media Services Live 5 (MSL5) is built to help broadcasters and media companies launch streams faster, reach wider audiences, and generate more revenue—all while cutting costs.

Ari Weil, VP of Product Marketing at Akamai, put it plainly: “We’ve accelerated the time that it takes to provision new streams. It used to take several hours. We’ve brought that down to seconds.” That speed means broadcasters can launch live content nearly instantly, whether for sports, news, or entertainment.

Beyond Speed: Extending Value

The service is more than just faster stream starts. Media Services Live 5 extends the live DVR window to 12 hours—giving viewers flexibility to catch up on sports or news—and doubles the maximum archive duration. These capabilities allow media companies to retain more content directly on the Akamai platform, avoiding the need to fetch data from remote origins or hyperscaler platforms. The result is lower latency, fewer slowdowns, and no surprise egress costs.

Monetization Meets Efficiency

Harmonic’s proven expertise in live streaming underpins the platform, and together with Akamai, the solution adds new monetization options across a wider set of video formats. This ensures media companies can align ad models with how audiences actually consume streams. As Weil explained, “Customers will benefit from support for a wider variety of video formats, they’ll have more monetization options, and they’ll be able to improve their user experience with better control over their streams.”

With Media Services Live 5, Akamai and Harmonic aren’t just making live streaming faster—they’re making it smarter, more cost-efficient, and more aligned with how global audiences consume media today.