Domain Boardroom Celebrates 10th Birthday

Elliot Silver
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11

Domain Boardroom, a private domain industry discussion forum founded by Donna Mahony, is celebrating its 10th birthday today:

I have been a member of DBR since Donna created it, and it is hard to believe it has been ten years already. To put it in perspective for me a bit, I wasn’t even married when I joined!

Donna told me there are approximately 200 members of Domain Boardroom. She also said there is usually a list of at least 50 applications from people who are interested in becoming members of DBR.

Here’s what Donna had to say about DBR on its 10th birthday:

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Mike Mann Has “best month yet”

Elliot Silver
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23

Mike Mann’s company owns one of the largest private domain name portfolios, which he sells via his marketplace,  DomainMarket.com. This morning on Twitter, he announced that this has been “the best month yet” in his 20 year career selling domain names:

While the success of one person or company doesn’t necessary mean much for the entire industry, I think Mike’s tweet is notable given the size and broad nature  of his company’s domain name portfolio.  It would be more notable for the domain name resale market  at large if other large portfolio owners also shared that they had a great month.

My company has  a relatively small portfolio of 500+/- domain names, so my monthly sales results wouldn’t be any kind of barometer for the industry in general. A few  anomalously large sales can move the needle. Essentially, the velocity of my sales and offers wouldn’t be any kind of indicator of the health of the domain name resale marketplace.

Have you had a great month for domain name sales?

Victor Pitts Hired by MMX as Director of Premium Sales

Elliot Silver
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1

MMX LogoThis morning, I received an announcement about another noteworthy domain industry hiring. Industry veteran Victor Pitts has joined MMX (formerly known as Minds & Machines) as Director of Premium Sales for the Americas. Many people in the domain space likely know Victor from his days at Moniker (and Oversee.net), and more recently at Above.com.

In his new role with MMX, Victor will be working on selling some of the premium-designated domain names in the new extensions operated by MMX. Victor will also be working on various industry partnerships. I am sure his industry experience will be particularly helpful with the later aspect of his new role.

MMX also recently hired Solomon Amoako as VP of Channel Management.

The press release announcing the news is found below. Thank you to Simon Cousins for sharing the news with me.

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Epik Hires Joseph Peterson as Director of Operations

Elliot Silver
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22

epikRob Monster, CEO of Epik, announced the hiring of Joseph Peterson as Director of Operations at Epik. Many people in the domain industry will recognize Joseph’s name from his articles written on Domain Name Wire, as well as his well thought out written contributions in comments on domain industry blogs and forums.

This hiring is the second big announcement from Epik in the last couple of weeks. Two weeks ago, the company announced the acquisition of Undeveloped.com, a domain name sales marketplace. Although the value of the deal was not shared at the time of the announcement, Rob later told OnlineDomain.com the price was 4 million Euros.

The press release distributed by Epik has more information about Joseph’s background and the role he will have at the company. You can find that below:

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Epik Acquires Undeveloped (Updated)

Elliot Silver
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2

Reza-Rob-Done-DealAccording to  Epik founder Rob Monster, Epik has acquired the Undeveloped domain name marketplace and sales platform founded by Reza Sardeha. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but it appears  that the current team operating Undeveloped will stay on board and the two companies will continue to operate separately. According to the press release “Undeveloped will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Epik Holdings Inc group of Companies with the current management team.”

Rob sent me an email with a press release announcing the news, and I have published that below:

Dutch Startup Undeveloped.com Announces Acquisition by US-based Epik Holdings Inc.


Undeveloped joining Epik allows the company to introduce a full-service solution for buying, selling, leasing and managing domains.

Undeveloped.com announced today that it has been acquired by Epik Holdings inc. The integration of the two companies will help Undeveloped further accelerate the growth of its marketplace for digital brands, after more than doubling transactions in 2016, while accelerating Epik’s international expansion.

“By combining Epik’s reputation, market knowledge, worldwide presence, and complementary technology, we expect to be able to create an even more appealing solution for our customers. A vastly improved Undeveloped marketplace will accelerate the progress of more development-grade domains into becoming thriving Digital Brands used in commerce. All things considered, we could not have asked for a more worthy or more capable partner at this exciting time in the history of the Internet” said Mr. Reza Sardeha, founder and CEO of Undeveloped.

Rob Monster, Founder and CEO of Epik Holdings Inc, who is a Dutch-American, was pleased to announce the completion of the transaction in Amsterdam.

“We have spent the past 5 years developing and operating an integrated set of solutions to help domain investors navigate the life-cycle of their domain investments. With this acquisition, we add another company with potential for hyper-growth. This acquisition has all of the things that I look for in a deal: great leadership, differentiated technology, and complementary locality. The expanded presence in Amsterdam will significantly increase our capacity to deliver to customers in Europe, Middle East and Africa, the type of Legendary Support and customer-centric innovation that our customers have come to expect from us.” said Rob Monster, CEO and founder of Epik.

Undeveloped will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Epik Holdings Inc group of Companies with the current management team. Epik customers can seamlessly use the services of Undeveloped through the same single-sign-on that already powers Epik’s existing services at Epik.com, Anonymize.com and Masterbucks.com. “My team and I are delighted to be part of a rapidly growing company led by a visionary CEO who I have enjoyed getting to know over the past year” added Mr. Reza Sardeha, founder and CEO of Undeveloped.

For further information, please contact Rob Monster, CEO of Epik at rob@epik.com or +1.425-765-0077, or Reza Sardeha, CEO of Undeveloped.com at reza@undeveloped.com.

Update: According to OnlineDomain.com, “Undeveloped and Epik decided to discontinue working together”

Epik Sends CloudBleed Email Update

Elliot Silver
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2

You may have already heard about a recently discovered security bug called CloudBleed. Based on what I have read about the bug, users of many websites could potentially be impacted, and people may not even know their accounts could become compromised. I presume there is the potential that this could involve domain industry companies.

Yesterday, I received an email from Epik that I want to share with you. I think it is a good idea for Epik (and other companies) to address this ASAP and make sure their customers are aware of the situation. Kudos to Epik for informing customers of the issue almost immediately. Hopefully other industry companies that may be impacted will follow suit.

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