Who Might Buy Godaddy.com? The Fool.com Puts Up Its List

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The Fool.com just published an article listing who they think might be the buyer for Godaddy.com

In its article entitled “Whose Hot For Godaddy”, the Fool.com lays out what they consider to be the most likely buyer of Godaddy.com.

The Fool.com came up with these companies:

Google, Amazon.com, Cisco Systems, Oracle,  Hewlett-Packard, IBM and Microsoft.

To read about their reasoning for their picks you will have to check out the full article.

How about Yahoo, Network Solutions, Register.com?

Who are your picks?

About Michael Berkens

Michael Berkens, Esq. is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of TheDomains.com. Michael is also the co-founder of Worldwide Media Inc. which sold around 70K domain to Godaddy.com in December 2015 and now owns around 8K domain names . Michael was also one of the 5 Judges selected for the the Verisign 30th Anniversary .Com contest.

Comments

  1. Rob Sequin says

    Please not yahoo, nsi, register or microsoft. Either of those companies would suck the life out of godaddy and I doubt Bob would sell to any of those lousy companies. Put AOL in there too.

    Google or Amazon but watch for an off line business like Hearst publications. Also news corp too.

    Just a side note, the article says “…in the always required business of managing Internet domain names.”

    As if there are some other domain names besides Internet domain names? Shows even the author of this article has to qualify the term “domain names”. Kinda sad really.

  2. Gazzip says

    my picks would be Google or Microsoft, it’ll take a huge company like them to keep GoDaddy profitable in the years ahead IMHO

    .

  3. Jim Fleming says

    “Who are your picks?”

    The best buyer for the benefit of “The Domain Industry” would be VERISIGN.
    [Verisign recently sold their CA business for $1.3B]

    Then, ICANN can be dissolved. There would be no need for all of the
    charades and fees passing between all the players. Prior to 1998, before
    ICANN, people went directly to the .COM Registry. That could be restored
    and the cost should approach the 50 cents per year that people estimate it
    costs to manufacture a .COM entry.

    The U.S. Department of Commerce, the DOJ, the SEC and several other agencies
    would have to intervene to encourage this scenario.

  4. Mojito Recipe says

    Register.com was recently acquired by Web.com. Yahoo! actually seems like the best match considering their registration, hosting, and e-commerce initiatives.

    It might be smarter to take that $1 billion and put it toward the $6-7 billion it would take to likely acquire VeriSign.

  8. M. Menius says

    I believe a GoDaddy acquisition would have appeal to not so apparent buyers as well. Simply because it represents access to a large volume of customers … many of whom are sizable businesses.

    I’m thinking multimedia players like News Corp who are quite diversified. Kind of like the T

  9. M. Menius says

    I believe a GoDaddy acquisition would have appeal to not so apparent buyers as well. Simply because it represents access to a large volume of customers … many of whom are sizable businesses.

    I’m thinking multimedia players like News Corp who are quite diversified. Kind of like the Time Warner – AOL merger, but something that makes better sense and might actually work.

  10. Gazzip says

    “One has to wonder how much of Godaddy’s growth was domainer driven”

    With all these recent new extensions and GoDaddy being a preferred register of many domainers it has to be a HUGE amount.

  17. Jim Fleming says

    Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP)
    …
    1946 – Avis is founded by Warren Avis at Willow Run Airport in Detroit with an $85,000 investment. This is the first car rental operation located at an airport. Soon after, facilities are opened at Miami Airport.
    1965 – ITT Corporation buys Avis for $51 million.
    1987 – Avis’ Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) purchases Avis for $750 million, plus the assumption of debt. Avis is considered a model ESOP company and is one of the largest employee-owned companies in the United States. WizCom International, Ltd., an Avis subsidiary, is established to market the company’s renowned computer expertise to major hotel chains around the world and other industries, including other car rental companies.

  19. Yaron says

    I think
    Google / Microsoft / Amazon / Ebay

    msft got the yahoo numbers, so I guess if they will buy they know what they are doing.

    dont forget Google and Yahoo are the main parking feed providers which means they can cut the middle man (godaddy) on parking.

    Amazon and Ebay are just two great candidates with their huge customer base

  21. Jim Fleming says

    Another approach, discussed many many years ago, for Registries (and big Registrars) would be to tie one domain to one share of stock.

    The more domains one “owns” the larger share of the company they own.

    Some Internet Clerics get very nervous when people talk about “owning” a domain name. They become rabid when people talk about owning IP Address Space (like land). They then tax everyone and laugh all the way to the bank.

  22. Chris Sivertsen says

    MSFT – Perfect for them. They’ve missed the boat on search and everything else online and they buy their way into the market trying to catch up. I’m sure simply switching the GoDaddy parking over to Bing would move the needle for them like crazy.