Consolidation: 2020 in Review
Two major registries were among the domain name businesses gobbled up in 2020.
This is the second in a series of posts regarding the domain name industry in 2020. Read the others here.
If you want to make a guaranteed prediction regarding the future of the domain name industry, just predict that there will be more consolidation.
2020 was another year of big acquisitions in the domain name business.
It started with GoDaddy (NYSE: GDDY) announcing the buyout of Uniregistry (the registrar business, not the registry) and Frank Schilling’s domain name portfolio for something less than $200 million.
GoDaddy followed up by entering into the wholesale registry business in a big way by acquiring Neustar’s registry business for $218 million.
Donuts is acquiring Neustar’s archrival Afilias in a deal that ought to close by the end of the year.
CentralNic (London AIM: CNIC) continues to roll up the domain industry and has expanded its horizons to online advertising following acquiring Team Internet in 2019. It bought CodeWise for $36 million this year.
Web.com purchased Fresh Zealand domain name registrar FreeParking following losing a planned buyout of WebCentral, which went to Australian firm 5G Networks instead.
There’s continuing consolidation among fresh top level domains, too. XYZ has been particularly acquisitive.
And, although it’s not technically consolidation, Clearlake Capital Group’s $3 billion buyout of Endurance International Group (NASDAQ: EIGI) shows that private equity is still very interested in the domain name space.
Which brings us to the buyout that didn’t happen. More on that in the next post.
