Business.com Sells For $350 Million

By WebProNews Staff - Thu, 07/26/2007 - 6:01am.

The $7.5 million price tag for Business.com paid by two businessmen in 1999 looks like a fantastic bargain now that R.H. Donnelley has purchased it for roughly $350 million.

That $100 million for Dictionary.com may have been a bargain for Answers.com. If they had wanted Business.com, they would have paid three and a half times the price.

PaidContent said yellow page and local search firm R.H. Donnelley elbowed aside several competitors at auction for the domain and its connected search and directory services:

The auction was heated, and initially included IAC, New York Times, DJ and News Corp. IAC didn’t end up bidding, News Corp dropped out as the price went above $300 million, Dow Jones couldn’t pull it together in the wake of all the turmoil with News Corp bid, and New York Times was in there until late in the game.

Sky Dayton, current CEO of Helio, is best known for founding the EarthLink ISP. He and Jake Winebaum picked up the Business.com domain in 1999, a few months before the dot-com industry's fortunes cratered on Wall Street.

The big bucks they spent eight years ago seemed nonsensical, but their decision proved profitable eight years later. Now we have to wonder if another domain name sale will ever top the price tag for Business.com.

News Tags: Sky Dayton, domain, Sky, R.H. Donnelley, Business.com, HTTP

Comments

Submitted by steven emery (WPN reader) on Fri, 07/27/2007 - 1:24pm.

A Priceless Domain Name

The Premium Vertical Land grab of the 21st century is over. Time to let these vacant lots turn into skyscrapers of strategic vertical location. the speed of social change and search as we know it will be unfathomable.
certain things stick out on this planet and the generic term business.com is one of the greatest. You can compare it to the sun. A huge mass that needs no explanation and is seen and felt in the hearts and minds of the world on a daily basis. what is the value of the sun if you could put your ad sign on it. Your absolutely right…………….. Priceless.
DomainerLocator.com

Submitted by jay restern (WPN reader) on Sun, 07/29/2007 - 2:35pm.

business.com

There exist many opportunities in purchasing valuable domain names. Domain names are not going away, the same way the early personal computers of the eighties, slow and clunky have evolved to light weight powerful modern machines.

There will always be just one business.com even in fifty years for that matter. Think about it, just ten years ago many generic domain names could have been registered by you!

http://www.idirecttraffic.com

Submitted by rafiq (WPN reader) on Thu, 07/26/2007 - 11:40pm.

What? $350 million?

Oh my good. Unbelievable.. Why they are spending such a huge money on a domain name. If they have a good business model, they can easily market any domain name. No matter is easy to remember, short, etc. I dont get it.

But anyway, when they are spending that much money, they might definitely have a plan to multiply it. All the best.

-Rafiq
http://rafiq.ws

Submitted by John Qu (WPN reader) on Thu, 07/26/2007 - 6:42am.

Domain name or not?

I have the feeling there's more than just the domain name included for this price tag ;)

Nonetheless, still a lot of money...

Submitted by WebProNews Staff on Thu, 07/26/2007 - 10:43am.

More than a name

Sure, there's technology, similar to what Donnelley already has. I don't think the bidding would have reached nine figures without a highly-desired domain name like Business.com.

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