Donuts’ DPML trademark protection service to soar — Cost of
At least one registrar is increasing the price by 76% as fresh TLD firm hikes price of brand protection service.
Top level domain name provider Donuts will significantly increase the price of its Domains Protected Marks List (DPML) on January 1, 2017.
DPML enables trademark holders to block certain second level strings across its entire portfolio of nearly 200 top level domain names. Trademark holders use the service to prevent cybersquatting on their brand names.
The firm previously revealed that an increase would take place next year, but did not say how much.
While the firm still declines to say how much the wholesale price is or what it will be next year, domain name registrar Hexonet recently informed clients of the upcoming price hike.
Hexonet right now charges $2,500 to its highest tier clients for a five-year DPML block. That price will increase to $4,400 in January, a whopping 76% hike.
One-year renewals at Hexonet will increase from $500 to $880 in its best price tier. That’s also a 76% increase.
That comes out to $4.40 per domain per year assuming 200 TLDs.
In response to an inquiry from Reglike regarding the price increase, Donuts VP of Communications Mason Cole stated:
Donuts has increased the wholesale price of its legacy DPML service in order to align the benefits of the service with marketplace value, and to reflect the wider protection offered by the addition of fresh domains to the Donuts portfolio, now totaling almost 200. The service provides trademark holders with an efficient and cost effective way to protect their trademarked terms in all Donuts domains without the expensive and laborious process of defensive registration, and remains much more cost effective and valuable than those of competitors, which offer a nearly identical service for far fewer extensions. Retail pricing is at the discretion of each registrar making the service available to its clients. As previously disclosed, brand owners may renew their subscriptions at current pricing ahead of December 31.
