Cloudflare's Strategy Focuses on Speed and Network Efficiency as its 'Secret Sauce,' Analyst Says After Speed Week Event

Baird analyst Shrenik Kothari maintains Cloudflare Inc NET with an Outperform, raising the price target from $59 to $64.

NET showcased its commitment to speed and network efficiency at the recently concluded Speed Week. Cloudflare's strategy centers around its high-speed network efficiency, its 'secret sauce.' 

Leveraging its efficient network, NET can bundle IT-spend to foster customer loyalty, minimize churn, and compete successfully against security market leaders. This strategic focus is evident in its new products and AI/ML advancements. 

Speed Week underlined its network leadership in multiple areas, from the fastest compute, DNS, and ZTNA to the fastest Secure Web Gateway and object storage. 

Whether improving website speed or enhancing Zero Trust, performance is critical across all products. From the fastest compute, DNS, to the reportedly fast Secure Web Gateway per the latest published tests and object storage, Speed Week underlined its network leadership in multiple areas and demonstrated NET's continuous commitment to improved internet quality and performance. 

Speed Week unveiled NET's latest Zero Trust test results/data, aimed at providing businesses with insights into the performance experience of their workforce. 

NET's proximity to users and peering with major cloud providers is critical to its leading Zero Trust network performance. This results in minimal overhead and efficient packet routing. 

The company outperformed competitors in Secure Web Gateway tests, delivering up to 64% faster speeds. 

Its private backbone network also enhances connectivity, focusing on network performance rather than web application content loading and rendering. 

Speed Week 2023 saw the launch of new products like Observatory, Digital Experience Monitoring, Smart Hints, and Timing Insights that provide insight into application/website performance. 

The company is committed to ensuring the fastest possible service in all its offerings. NET launched the Observatory platform to aid businesses in enhancing their websites' performance. 

Digital Experience Monitoring (DEX), now in beta, offers teams a way to measure end-user connectivity and performance over their network. 

Smart Hints are an innovative attempt to automate performance improvements. 

By automating 'Early Hints' and 'Fetch Priorities', NET aims to streamline website performance enhancements without requiring code changes. 

Timing Insights is another noteworthy introduction to its analytical toolkit. It provides critical insights into what contributes to the "Time to First Byte" (TTFB) of NET and the user's origin, aiding in diagnosing performance issues.

Price Action: NET shares traded higher by 4.71% at $66.94 on the last check Wednesday.