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Tucows

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Revision as of 04:34, 22 August 2012 by Caterina (talk | contribs)
ICANNWiki Bronze Sponsor
Type: Public
Industry: Internet, Registrar
Founded: Flint, Michigan, USA (1993)
Founder(s): Scott Swedorski
Colin Campbell
Headquarters: 96 Mowat Avenue,
Toronto, ON M6K 3M1
Country: Canada
Businesses: OpenSRS, ISPBilling.com, Butterscotch.com,
YummyNames, Hover, Ting
Employees: ~200 (2010)
Revenue: $97 million (2011)
Website: TucowsInc.com
Twitter: @tucows
Key People
Elliot Noss, President and Chief Executive Officer

Michael Cooperman, Chief Financial Officer
Adam Eisner
Carla Goertz, Vice President, Human Resources
David Woroch, Vice President, Sales
Ken Schafer, Vice President, Marketing and Product Management
Ross Rader, General Manager of Hover

Tucows, an acronym for The Ultimate Collection of Winsock Software, is best known for its popular website directory of shareware, freeware, and demo software packages available for download.

In February, 2012, Tucows launched a new mobile carrier, Ting.[1]

History[edit | edit source]

  • 1993 Tucows began in Flint, Michigan. It was originally started by Scott Swedorski as a website to offer software on a freeware or shareware basis.
  • 1995 Tucows is aquired by Toronto-based ISP Internet Direct.[2]
  • 2000 Tucows launches an OpenSRS platform and began accepting domain name registrations from ISPs and web hosting companies.[3]
  • 2001 Tucows merges with Infonautics, Inc., an internet information services company.[4]
  • 2007 Tucows acquires ItsYourDomain.com,, a privately held ICANN-accredited wholesale registrar offering domain services through a network of over 2,500 affiliates with over 700,000 domains under management.[6]
  • 2008 Tucows launches Hover.com. Tucows discontinues ItsYourDomain.com, NetIdentity, and DomainDirect, merges them, and forms Hover.[7]
  • 2008 Tucows announces the launch of Butterscotch.com, an online video network with video tutorials to explain internet technology.[8]
  • 2010 Tucows announces that it has undertaken a "Dutch auction" to purchase 3.9 million shares of its stock for a $.70 per share.[9]

Products and Services offered by Tucows[edit | edit source]

Tucows earned a name early on for being the first website to provide "freeware" and "shareware" software. They currently host more than 40,000 titles that are proven vires- and spyware-free through an international network of partner sites. These partner sites ensure that software downloads are fast, local, and secure.[10]

Apart from Tucows.com, Tucows also owns many other sites:

  • OpenSRS.com: A platform for resellers. OpenSRS manages over ten million domain names, millions of mailboxes for a network of over 10,000 web hosts, ISPs, and other resellers around the world.
  • ISPBilling.com: Platypus Billing System is specifically designed for ISP, WISP and Web Hosting business.
  • Butterscotch.com: An online video network with video tutorials to explain internet technology.
  • YummyNames.com: YummyNames oversees the tens of thousands of domain names owned by Tucows. YummyNames offers domain name consulting services specifically designed for marketers, along with the sales and leasing of premium domains from the Tucows portfolio through the YummyNames website.
  • Hover.com: Tucows provides domain names, email and other services through an extensive reseller network called OpenSRS. They sell these services directly to consumers and small businesses through a retail group known as Hover.

Ting[edit | edit source]

In February, 2012, Tucows launched a new mobile carrier, Ting.[11] The service is aimed at building a variable service around the customer's needs; for example, should you use minutes over or under the parameters of your current plan, you will be billed at whichever plan corresponds to your usage as opposed to facing over-usage fees or paying for more data and minutes than you use.

Revenue[edit | edit source]

In the fourth quarter of 2011, Tucows posted a revenue of $26.4 million, it marked the 7th consecutive quarter of record revenue and it brought the annual revenue for 2011 to $97 million. Its domain portfolio reseller, YummyNames, performed particularly well and saw its revenue up 24% over one year.[12]

On January 2012, Tucows announced that it will purchase a total of 7,569,952 shares of its Common Stock at $0.77 per share. The total purchase price of the stock is $5,828,863. The company expects to own approximately 46,047,337 shares issued and outstanding once the purchase transaction is completed.[13]

Other[edit | edit source]

In protest of SOPA and PIPA, Tucows, along with other well-known sites on the Internet, blacked out their Tucows Software Download site on January 18th from 8am to 8pm EST (1300-0100 UTC).[14]

References[edit | edit source]

External links[edit | edit source]

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