I haven't heard this particular phrase before vut I'm familiar with the concept. I've seen more than one show on the Wild West, various gold rushes and so forth. This concept comes up again and again.

One show coined this as "mining the miners", which I like.

There is a danger here though. If your business is selling pickaxes then it lives and dies by the mining industry. But I guess that applies to a lot of business types.

Another danger for B2B type businesses like Akamai is with no brand identity and loyalty you are in danger of being swapped and/or commoditized.