Last night, I noticed that Richard Kirkendall no longer had the NamecheapCEO account on X. Instead, his account handle changed to NamecheapCEO123, which I was following. I mentioned this precautionary in the event he had lost control of the account for some reason. Fortunately, the change was intentional.
In a post on X early this morning, Richard shared that he has stepped aside as Namecheap CEO. This change comes in the wake of CVC Capital Partner’s $1.5 billion acquisition of Namecheap. According to Richard, the new CEO of Namecheap is Hillan Klein, who has been the company’s Chief Operating Officer for 12 years.
Richard has been a hands on CEO of Namecheap for as long as I can recall. He frequently responded to customer comments and complaints, and he has always been actively involved in discussions involving Namecheap products and services. Hopefully the new operator of the NamecheapCEO account on X has that same approach.
I embedded Richard’s post below:
Hey everyone — I’ve seen a few of you wondering why I updated my handle. I’m in the middle of transitioning to a new one.
Why the change?
As part of the sale to our partners at CVC, I decided early on that I did not want to remain CEO. I’ve led this company for more than 25…
— Richard Kirkendall (@namecheapceo123) December 16, 2025
