I am a bit late to this discussion, and RiddleKing summarized it nicely, but the Akkan is an extremely useful capital ship in the early game, and is always my first choice as TEC.  After the first level of colonize, I focus on targeting uplink to give me the first shot (or two) in any engagement, as well as increased weapons accuracy.  This enables an Akkan with a support fleet to neutralize even the more heavily-defended neutral planets without losses, which is especially important in the early game.  This generally frees up enough resources for you to build a colony ship and a second support fleet with which to colonize in another direction simultaneously.

In the later game, ion bolt and armistice also become important, so the Akkan can be an important part of both offensive and defensive operations.  However, I never seem to need more than one.

It depends on people's preferences, the Akkan is quite a good support ship and the stun can make sure the enemy never escapes as it has a CD of only like 7 secs?? lower if u lvl it up. But also it very rapidly speeds up expansion in the early stages, which can be a BIG advantage.