Datagroup to offer Akamai WAF to businesses in Ukraine
Ukrainian telecom Datagroup partners with Akamai to offer pay-as-you-go cloud WAF to small and medium businesses, lowering the barrier to enterprise-grade web application protection in a high-threat market.
Ukrainian telecom operator Datagroup has partnered with Akamai to bring cloud-based WAF protection to small and medium businesses in Ukraine. Datagroup, part of the DVL Group, will act as the local managed security provider for the service.
Pay-as-you-go WAF for SMEs
The offering is built on Akamai App & API Protector, one of the more established enterprise WAF platforms. The key selling point for Ukrainian businesses is the pay-as-you-go pricing model. No capital investment required upfront. Companies can scale protection up or down based on actual traffic and threat levels.
This matters because most SMEs in the region have been priced out of serious WAF protection. Enterprise WAF contracts typically require annual commitments and dedicated security staff to manage. A managed service model through a local telco removes both barriers.
Why Ukraine, why now
Ukrainian businesses have faced a massive spike in cyber attacks since 2022. Government agencies and private companies alike have been targets of sustained DDoS campaigns, web defacements, and application-layer attacks. The demand for WAF protection is real and growing, but the market has been underserved.
Datagroup already has the network infrastructure and customer relationships in place. Wrapping Akamai WAF into their existing telecom services is a smart distribution play. Businesses get enterprise-grade protection without needing to evaluate, procure, and manage a WAF on their own.
WAFplanet take
This is the kind of partnership that makes WAF protection more accessible. The self-serve cloud WAF market is crowded, but most of those products still assume the customer knows what they are doing. Managed WAF through a local provider fills a real gap, especially in markets where security talent is scarce and threats are constant.
The bigger trend here is telcos becoming security service providers. Expect more of these partnerships globally as Cloudflare, Imperva, and Akamai all push channel distribution to reach mid-market customers they cannot sell to directly.
