eShop.com is currently in auction at NameJet and SnapNames. I think it has the potential to be one of the largest Pending Delete auctions on the Web.com-owned platforms in quite some time.
Prior to its deletion, eShop.com was most recently owned by Microsoft. Archive.org shows the domain name has not been used by Microsoft since 2010 when it was part of MSN Shopping. eShop.com had been created in 1994, and the domain name expired in January of 2021. Because it was not renewed at Com Laude, it went through the entire deletion cycle. The domain name was caught by a Web.com registrar, and it is in auction at NameJet and SnapNames. The new creation date for eShop.com is March 27, 2021.
There are 294 bidders who backordered this domain name and well over 300 bids. At the time of publication, the high bid for eShop.com is nearly $50,000 with a little more than 24 hours remaining in the auction.
It is atypical to see high quality domain names once owned by major tech brands in a Pending Delete auction like this. Microsoft could have sold this domain name for a substantial amount of money rather than simply allowing it to expire. In the whole scheme of things for MSFT, this will be a very small amount of lost potential revenue, but it is still peculiar to see a domain name like eShop.com get deleted and auctioned.
Update: eShop.com sold this afternoon for $148,134.
ended at 148k!
it appears like someone got an extraordinary .com for a very reasonable price. Thanks for the info and update Elliot