.auction

Status:	Delegated
Date Implemented:	18 July 2014
Type:	Generic
Category:	Commerce
More information:

.auction is a delegated new generic top level domain name with ICANN's New gTLD Program. The proposed application succeeded and was delegated to the Root Zone on 18 July, 2014.

Current Applicant

1. Donuts (SandGalley, LLC), the company is represented by Daniel Schindler, EVP of Donuts, a start-up registry company founded by domain industry veterans which applied for 307 gTLDs. This applicant submitted a Public Interest Commitment, which can be downloaded here.

Previous Applicant

1. Uniregistry, a new registry company established by domain investor Frank Schilling, which invested $60 million on 54 gTLD applications.

Private Deal

In February 2014, it was reported that Uniregistry and Donuts reached a private deal which resolved a number of New gTLD string contention sets involving only the two companies. Although the deal coincided with a round of Private Auctions conducted by Applicant Auction on February 18th, neither companies immediately commented on the nature of the deal and Applicant Auction did not disclose the participants of its recent auctions. If the companies had participated in a private auction, it would mark the first private auctions that Uniregistry participated in, after the company initially questioned the legality of private auctions in the New gTLD Program.

In the private deal, Donuts became the sole applicant for .auction, .furniture, and .gratis, while Uniregistry won .audio and .juegos.