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Top Level Design

From ICANNWiki
Revision as of 00:46, 12 March 2019 by Andrew505 (talk | contribs) (updated for .gay)
Type: Private
Founded: 2012
Founder(s): Raymond King, Peter Brual
Country: USA
Website: toplevel.design
LinkedIn: [1]
Key People
Raymond King, CEO

Owen Borseth, CTO
Andrew Merriam, Business Development Director
Elise Ferguson, Policy Manager
Summer Fang, Partnership Manager
Ross Brackett, Support Manager
Kimberly Sheng, Chinese Market Coordinator
Nikki Rodriguez, Director of Design
Sam Torrey, Digital Marketing Specialist

Top Level Design, LLC is a company created in 2012 by Raymond King and Peter Brual to apply for TLDs in ICANN's New gTLD Program. The company submitted 10 applications to ICANN for: .art, .blog, .design, .gay, .group, .ink, .llc, .photography, .style and .wiki.

In June 2013, Top Level Design LLC participated in the first round of private[1] gTLD Auctions held by Innovative Auctions. The auction resulted in Donuts out-bidding Top Level Design in the .photography contention set.[2] CEO, Raymond King, was quoted as saying, "The applicant auction process was great, the software functioned without a hitch and all of the folks involved were responsive and highly professional. We look forward to participating in future auctions with Innovative Auctions."[3]

In September 2014, Top Level Design acquired .design through private auction. Ray King was quoted as saying, "Think of all the things that require design. Design permeates all aspects of culture."[4] .Design became generally available on May 5th, 2015.

In March 2019, Top Level Design won the .gay contention set at private auction.[5]

Top Level Design has contracted CentralNic for its backend registry services and is using Iron Mountain for its required data escrow services.[6]

Relation to ICANNWiki.com

This site, ICANNWiki.com, is also managed by Raymond King. The ICANNWiki team notes that its content and presentation of new gTLD information will in no way interfere with or be compromised by the separate Top Level Design, LLC venture.

References