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Key-Systems

From ICANNWiki
Type: GmbH (limited liability - Germany)
Industry: Internet, Domain Names
Founded: 1998
Founder(s): Alexander Siffrin
Ownership: KeyDrive SA
Headquarters: Im Oberen Werk 1
66386 St. Ingbert
Country: Germany
Products: domaindiscount24,
RRPproxy,
BrandShelter,
SkyWay DataCenter,
KSregistry,
toweb Brasil
nicSaarland
Employees: KS HQ 80+, KD/KS group 120+
Website: Key-Systems.net
Facebook: KeySystems
Twitter: @Key_Systems
Key People
Alexander Siffrin, CEO
Bonnie Wittenburg, (EVP, USA)

Jessica Pfeiffer, Marketing/Human Resources
Volker Greimann, General Counsel
Jochen Kieler, International Business Development
Markus Müller, Business Development (Domainer)
Andreas Soll, Product Manager (BrandShelter)

Key-Systems Group is a leading international internet service provider. Key-Systems was founded in 1998 by Alexander Siffrin and received it's accreditation from ICANN as an official registrar in October, 2000. The German company has a branch office in the USA and provides services to its end-customers and resellers through its domain portals: RRPproxy, BrandShelter and domaindiscount24 [1].

As of Jan, 2014, the Key-Systems/ Moniker Group has over 6 million gTLD & ccTLD domains under its management.[2] The group is currently ranked second among leading registrars for global TLDs in Europe. They currently offer the fully-automated registration of more than 300 top-level and second-level domains and the will add over 700 new TLDs.[3] The Registry Services of Key-Systems (offered since 2001) is now concentrated in the new company KSregistry GmbH. Apart of registry services for 4 ccTLDs KSregsitry provides registry services for 27 new TLD applicants.

Key-Systems Group is part of KeyDrive SA, which was formed through a merger between Key-Systems and NameDrive in June 2011. In Januuary, 2012, KeyDrive acquired former rivals Moniker and SnapNames from Oversee.net for an undisclosed amount. Following the acquisition, the KeyDrive registrars collectively ranked sixth in the list of the world's largest ICANN-accredited registrars for generic TLDs.[4] Snapnames was sold in 2014 to web.com.

New gTLDs[edit | edit source]

Th company announced that its wholly-owned subsidiary KSregistry had been selected to provide back-end registry services for 3 ccTLDs and 27 gTLDs, including GeoTLDs such as .saarland and .zuerich, generic TLDs like .ski and .bio, and brand TLDs for leading companies from the automotive, finance, tourism, media and health sectors.

Key-Systems is a limited partner of dotBerlin GmbH since 2006 [1]

History[edit | edit source]

  • In October 1998, Alexander Siffrin founded Key-Systems GbR (Gesellschaft bürgerlichen Rechts), a civil law partnership company, in Friedrichsthal/Saarland, Germany.
  • Key-Systems GbR was turned into a limited liability company Key-Systems GmbH (Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung) in 2000. [5]
  • In 2000, Key-Systems launched DomainDiscount24.com (DD24), the domain portal for end-customers. On November 10th, 2000, ICANN announced that Key-Systems GmbH d/b/a DomainDiscount24.com had qualified to be accredited as a domain name registrar for the .com, .net, and .org domains.[6]
  • In 2001, Key-Systems launched its reseller portal RRPproxy.net. That same year, Key-Systems joined DENIC, an association for the administration of the German ccTLD (.de). Key-Systems also participated in the first meetings addressing the implementation of a domain dotEU TLD for Europe.
  • Key-Systems participated in Verisign's IDN testbed in 2002. At this point, Key-Systems provided more than 60 different domain name extensions.
  • In 2007, Key-Systems took over the former Verisign Namestore Business for leading ccTLDs, migrating the ccTLD domain portfolios to the RRPproxy platform.
  • In May, 2009, Key-Systems founded its US subsidiary in the Washington D.C. metro area, and Bonnie Wittenburg was announced as Executive Vice President for Key-Systems USA, Inc. [7]
  • In July 2009, Key-Systems invested in[DevKey Domain Management Solutions, buying 49% of its share.[8]
  • In 2010, Key-Systems moved to its new own corporate headquarter in St. Ingbert and built its own TIER III datacenter (SkyWay-DataCenter)</ref>
  • In February, 2012 Key-Systems outsourced its registry services division KSregistry into a new subsidiary, KSregistry GmbH[11].
  • In 2014 dotSaarland GmbH started its operation of the new Geo TLD .saarland (nic.saarland); (Key-Systems holds the majority of the dotSaarland GmbH).

Products and Services[edit | edit source]

Key-Systems provides services to resellers, companies and end-customer's through its three domain portals.

  • RRPproxy: for domain-resellers of both gTLD and ccTLD domain names, RRPproxy provides registration of domains through a WebInterface, Direct-Socket-Access, Email-Template, or API.
  • BrandShelter: helps to manage and monitor huge domain portfolios, and includes support in planning, executing and operating a TLD including registry services by KSregistry.
  • domaindiscount24 (dd24): domain registration portal, including web and mailspace offers available in five different languages, targeted at retail customers.

Awards[edit | edit source]

Key-Systems received the Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Award in 2008, 2009, 2010 amd 2011. [12] [13]

References[edit | edit source]

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