Registrar giant created as Web.com merged with Endurance

Clearlake Capital Group, which has taken Endurance International private and recently took a big stake in Web.com, has merged the two registrar stables to create a new company it’s calling Newfold Digital.

By my reckoning, Newfold has probably become the second-largest registrar group by domains under management, with around 16.5 million gTLD names across just its best-known half-dozen brands, leapfrogging Namecheap and Tucows in the registrar league table.

That number’s probably a big understatement. It doesn’t capture ccTLDs and does not take into account that the company now has hundreds of active ICANN accredited registrars, largely due to Web.com’s drop-catching business.

Its best-known registrar brands are Register.com, Network Solutions, Domain.com, BuyDomains, BigRock, PublicDomainRegistry and CrazyDomains. Its BlueHost and HostGator brands are both pretty big deals in web hosting.

Clearlake says Newfold has 6.7 million customers worldwide.

The privatization of Endurance, which sees it delisted from the Nasdaq stock exchange, was announced in November and cost Clearlake $3 billion. The value of its Web.com stake, which it acquired last month, was not disclosed.

Siris Capital, which bought Web.com in 2018, continues to have a stake.

Newfold will be led by two Web.com execs — CEO Sharon Rowlands and CFO Christina Clohecy.

The deal follows Web.com’s unsuccessful attempt to buy Webcentral last year.

There’s no word on (presumably inevitable) layoffs as the two companies come together.

Another domain firm going private as Endurance announces $3 billion deal

Endurance International, owner of registrar brands including Domain.com, BigRock and BuyDomains, plans to go private in a $3 billion private equity deal.

The buyer is Clearlake Capital group, in what appears to be its first foray into the domain name market.

It has offered to pay $9.50 for each Endurance share, saying it’s a 79% premium on the closing price the day before the media first got a whiff of a deal being in the works back in September and a 64% premium on Friday’s close.

The deal is still subject to shareholder approval, but Endurance says institutional investors accounting for 36% of its shares have already promised to vote in favor.

Endurance yesterday also announced its third-quarter financial results. It reported net income down from $7.8 million to $6.7 million, on revenue that was up 3% at $278.4 million.

The company does not break out what portion of its revenue or profit comes from domains. Hosting and web marketing services are also a big part of its business.

Endurance domain revenue dips

Endurance International put in a poor show when it came to domains name sales in 2018.
Revenue and average revenue per registrant were both down in the fourth quarter and full-year results, which were announced this morning.
Endurance’s registrar business includes BigRock, Domain.com, FastDomain, PublicDomainRegistry.com and others.
Combined, those four brands account for almost 10 million gTLD domains under management, but that number has also been heading south recently.
The company said today that its fourth-quarter domain revenue was $31.3 million, down from $33 million a year earlier. It had 666,000 domain subscribers at the end of the quarter, down from 683,000.
Average revenue per subscriber for the quarter was also down, from $16.63 to $15.63.
For the full year, revenue was down from $133.6 million to $129.9 million and average revenue per subscriber was down from $16.98 to $16.05.
The shrinkage is reflected in the latest transaction reports filed with ICANN, too.
In October, the most recently reported month, all four of Endurance’s biggest registrar brands shrunk in terms of DUM.
PDR was the biggest loser — actually topping the list of shrinking registrars — shedding over 76,000 gTLD domains, over 10,000 of which was from net transfers.

Endurance losing founder-CEO next week

Endurance International, the parent company of registrar brands including Public Domain Registry, BuyDomains, Domain.com and BigRock, will see its founding CEO resign next week.
The company said this week that Hari Ravichandran will be replaced by Jeff Fox, most recently chair of customer relationship management software vendor Convergys, on August 22.
Endurance, which makes about 12% of its revenue from domain registrations, had disclosed Ravichandran’s plan to move on back in April, when it was characterized as an effort to move the company to the next stage of growth.
But it comes in the context, as the company has acknowledged, of an ongoing Securities and Exchange Commission investigation into its 2015 acquisition of Constant Contact.
The SEC probe has been going on since at least December 2015.
Endurance is also facing flattening top-line growth — revenue of $292.3 million, up 1% on last year, in the second quarter — and deepening losses.
Fox was CEO of Convergys from 2010 to 2012. He is also principal of The Circumference Group, his own investment/advisory firm.

Saucy domain name commercials… in India?

By now everybody is familiar with attempts by American companies such as Go Daddy, and more recently ICM Registry, to make domain names appear sexy in TV commercials.
But did you know BigRock.com is doing something similar in India, where the boundaries of decency are even more strictly defined than in the US?
I just enountered BigRock’s YouTube channel for the first time, and I think it’s fair to say that its commercials are somewhat “edgy” too, at least as measured by Indian standards.
Here are a few examples.


It’s possible to pick up on some social commentary in some of the spots, even if you don’t speak fluent Hinglish.

Victoria’s Secret seizes swimsuit domain, again

The lingerie retailer Victoria’s Secret has won a cybersquatting complaint over the domain name victoriasecretswimsuit.com for the second time in as many years.
Judging by the Whois history, it appears that the company lost the domain following the demise of rogue registrar Lead Networks, which lost its accreditation last year.
Victoria’s Secret first secured the domain with an easily won UDRP complaint in May 2009.
An attorney from its outside law firm was subsequently listed as the admin contact, but the registrar of record remained the same – the Indian outfit Lead Networks.
At some time between August and October last year, the Whois contact changed to the current registrant, who’s hiding behind a privacy service.
Probably not coincidentally, that was about the same time as ICANN, having terminated Lead Networks’ accreditation, bulk-transferred all of its domains to Answerable.com.
Lead Networks was placed into receivership in March 2010 following a cybersquatting lawsuit filed by Verizon.
Answerable.com, a Directi business also based in India, was the registrar’s designated successor under ICANN’s policies. It has subsequently changed its name to BigRock.com.
The latest UDRP decision does not explain how Victoria’s Secret managed to lose its registration, but I’d speculate the inter-registrar transfer may have had something to do with it.
When a registrar loses its accreditation the names are transferred to a new registrar but the term of the registration is not extended. If a registrant ignores or does not receive the notifications sent by the gaining registar, they may find they lose their domains.