GoDaddy Acquires 200,000 Domains For $28m From Marchex

GoDaddy has acquired the domain name portfolio business of Marchex a mobile advertising analytics company. The transaction included approximately 200,000 domain names and was completed for $28.1 million in cash plus $6.7 million in direct domain sales by Marchex since January 2015.

Marchex made the sale so as they can focus on their core business of mobile advertising analytics.

“Our complete focus is on establishing Marchex as the world’s leading mobile advertising analytics company,” said Pete Christothoulou, Marchex Chief Executive Officer. “A significant and growing majority of the consumer engagement and sales driven by mobile advertising happens offline, such as through phone calls. Narrowing our focus on this opportunity, while growing our balance sheet, strengthens our ability to continue delivering technology solutions that bring accountability to mobile advertising and transform business performance for our clients.”

With an average price of around $140 per domain, it suggests there are some quality domains in the portfolio.

“GoDaddy views this as a unique opportunity to acquire a large group of high quality names and make them available to businesses worldwide,” said GoDaddy Senior Vice President and General Manager Mike McLaughlin. “These names have not been generally available to the public. This means we’re able to bring more visibility and liquidity into the market for businesses everywhere. This is not a new direction for us, we have no plans to acquire additional domain names or expiring names.”

This acquisition builds on GoDaddy’s broader strategy to combine the primary and secondary domain name markets. GoDaddy acquired the world’s largest premium domain marketplace, Afternic, in Sept. 2013 and has now extended that technology platform to significantly increase the number of premium domain names available in its search results.

To see the list of names GoDaddy acquired, see www.NameFind.com

 posted by David Goldstein