Nov 6 (Reuters) - Akamai Technologies ( AKAM ) forecasts

fourth-quarter revenue above Wall Street estimates on Thursday,

buoyed by strong demand for its content delivery network

offerings and AI-cloud infrastructure services.

Shares of the company were up nearly 6% in extended trade.

Companies are investing heavily to secure applications and

web infrastructure amid accelerating adoption of cloud

technologies, benefiting Akamai's ( AKAM ) security and compute units.

The cybersecurity company expects fourth-quarter revenue

between $1.07 billion and $1.09 billion with the midpoint above

analysts' average estimate of $1.07 billion, according to LSEG

data.

"AI is a tailwind for us, pretty much across the board," CEO

Tom Leighton told Reuters.

Its cloud-computing revenue grew 8% to $180 million in

the third quarter.

While the company raised the midpoint of its annual revenue

forecast, it lowered its upper limit. It now expects 2025 sales

between $4.18 billion and $ 4.20 billion, compared with its

earlier outlook of $4.14 billion to $4.21 billion.

"As we have better visibility into the full year, and we

have another quarter now, we narrowed the range," CEO Leighton

said.

Akamai's ( AKAM ) customers include Adobe, eBay ( EBAY ) and

Electronic Arts ( EA ), as well as the U.S. Defense and Labor

departments.

The company provides content delivery network services to

optimize web performance and reduce bandwidth congestion.

However, it is facing mounting pressure as tech giants such

as Netflix ( NFLX ) and Apple ( AAPL ) continue to build out

their own content delivery networks, posing a threat to Akamai's ( AKAM )

traditional CDN business.

Delivery revenue was down 4% to $306 million in the third

quarter.

It posted third-quarter revenue of $1.06 billion, beating

analysts' consensus estimate of $1.04 billion.

Adjusted earnings of $1.86 per share also beat estimates.