I was reading through the most recent UDRP filings at the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), and I saw that a UDRP was filed for the MSC.com domain name. On the WIPO page for this UDRP, the complainant in this action is listed as a company called MSC Mediterrean [sp?] Shipping Company Holding S.A. It appears that there may be a typo on the WIPO website because that is not how you spell Mediterranean.
Aside from the fact that this is a three letter .com domain name and there are many companies around the world that use the “MSC” initials, this UDRP filing is notable because this domain name sold for quite a bit of money in 2013. According to Ron Jackson’s DNJournal sales report in December of 2013, MSC.com was reportedly sold for €35,000 via Sedo, which was approximately $47,600 USD. At the time of the report, that was the largest public sale of the week.
Since January of this year, MSC.com has been registered under privacy guard, so I do not know who bought the domain name. At the time of this post, the domain name forwards to what looks like an individual’s website. I don’t know how the domain name was being used prior to when I just visited it.
Assuming that there is a simple typo on the WIPO website, I used Google to find a company that looks like it could be the company that filed the UDRP complaint. Mediterranean Shipping Company SA, which uses the MSC initials throughout its website, uses mscgva.ch as its url for its website. Obviously, MSC.com would be more desireable for them to use.
Hopefully the domain name owner uses an attorney with UDRP experience to defend this valuable domain name. It’s very frustrating to see companies use the UDRP process to get high value domain names, and once the finding is published, we will see why the company believes it has rights to this domain name.
They also use MSC.us
Assuming there is a typo on the WIPO website and it’s the same company 🙂
A company with over 20 billion in revenue would approach the owner of MSC.com before they would attempt to do a UDRP. Based on the link below they are in the top 5 largest shipping companies in the world. UPS is number 1 and MSC is number 3 ahead of FEDEX. Why would a company this large try to steal a domain with a UDRP. There has got to be more to this story.
They have hundreds of domains using the MSC prefix such as MSCworldwide.com, MSChongkong.com, MSCgermany.com, MSCbelgium.com and the list goes on and on. Having one central hub at MSC.com would suit them well.
The domain investor who paid 50 grand for this domain obviously had this company in mind when he bought it for that price.
Top 5 shipping companies link
http://globial.com/globialtalksbusiness/top-5-shipping-companies/
I don’t think it is appropriate to make that judgment about the owner of the domain name, especially given the Whois privacy and how it is being used right now.
Additionally, I had never heard of this shipping company until I saw the UDRP filing, so I don’t think it’s fair to assume someone else had heard of it.
I am eager to read the actual filing to see what happened.
Your right but MSC.com forwards to a page that his name on it so I don’t see it being so private.
I could forward one of my domain names to your LinkedIn profile (for example) and it doesn’t mean you own the domain name.
There should be a site like Rick’s hallofshame for companies like this that try to bully people around to get what they want.
If this is how they do business, think of how they must treat there customer’s.
MSC.com is owned by the founder of this company http://cryptography.com/ I will not put his name here but he sold Cryptography Research for 343 million to a company named Rambus.
He is not a domain investor and is the end user and that is why he paid 50 grand for it. Chances are the shipping company tried to get in contact with him to try and buy it but he probably didn’t even respond to the emails because he is the end user and doesn’t want to sell it. MSC the shipping company decides to do a UDRP because they feel its the only way they can get the domain.
€35,000 is an “end user” business investment. As is a company dormant company registry.
For the average domain holder what would the attorney fees run for this type of case to try and defend a frivolous action?
Not sure, but I would imagine the attorney would recommend paying for a three person UDRP panel instead of the default one person panel. If I am reading it correctly, the respondent would have to pay the $2,500 difference between a one person panel and a three person panel:
http://www.wipo.int/amc/en/domains/fees/
This doesn’t include the actual attorney’s fees.
Why would the burden of paying for the WIPO panel be on the defendant? I could see the legal fees, but would think that the cost for the wipo would fall on the complainant, the whole system really seems broken.
The complainant pays for the standard one panelist complaint. From what I understand, it may be better odds to have 3 panelists deciding, so the respondent would need to pay for that “upgrade.”
MSC is quite a large cruise operator. Main page is http://www.msccruises.com
Does anyone know what ended up happening here? The WIPO site says the complaint was denied, yet the Shipping Company still seems to have acquired MSC.com somehow. I wonder if they ended up settling with Paul Kocher for a more substantial fee?