24th Feb 2015 08:35
LONDON (Alliance News) - Minds + Machines Group Ltd Tuesday said its total sales for its second half were GBP2.9 million, significantly increased from the USD486,00 is posted in its first half, as a result of eleven of the top-level domains in which it has a commercial interest becoming generally available.
The company also expects to post a profit of not less than USD33 million for 2014 from withdrawing applications in private top-level domain auctions.
A generic top level domain is the suffix on a web address, such as .com, and the ICANN has recently allowed for a cacophony of new generic top level domains to be launched.
There is strong competition for some generic top level domains, and as part of the process, if a company settles in a private auction, the winning bidder pays out to all of the losing parties. The company said that it invested USD25.9 million in acquiring uncontested application rights for six top-level domains during the year.
Since the year end, three further top-level domains have become generally available, including .casa, .work and .yoda. Five top level domains have entered the 'sunrise' period, meaning they are only available to trademark holders, and thirteen uncontested top-level domains are due to launch throughout 2015.
Minds + Machines has an interest in twelve contested top-level domains, which it expects to be resolved through private auction during the first half of 2015.
Between the beginning of September and end of December 2014, just over 107,000 domain names were registered with the company's portfolio of top-level domains, it said.
"With operations now fully established in the US and Europe, and significant cash reserves, we are on a strong footing to continue monetizing the expansion of the Internet's root zone through our declared strategy of owning and operating top-level domains," said Chairman Fred Krueger in a statement.
"As 2015 continues, we anticipate being able to capture greater wallet share, as well as drive consumer usage of new domain addresses, as a result of our registrar operations," Krueger added.
Shares in Minds + Machines were trading up 2.9% at 9.00 pence Tuesday morning.
By Hana Stewart-Smith; [email protected]; @HanaSSAllNews
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