Verisign to Manage .net Web Registry 6 More Years

By Spencer Swartz

VeriSign Inc., the top manager of Internet domain names that allow people to find and surf Web sites, will keep control of Internet addresses that end in .net for six more years, the group that oversees Internet address allocation said on Thursday.

The decision was expected after VeriSign in March got a tentative nod for the continued operation of the .net registry, which has provided VeriSign with about $20 million annually in revenue.

VeriSign beat four other applicants for the registry, said the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN, the private-public Internet oversight group.

VeriSign's current agreement for .net was scheduled to expire on June

Under VeriSign's new contract, which takes effect in July, the company will charge .25 annually for a new .net registry from previously.

The .net registry is a relatively small part of total Internet domain registrations, accounting for 7 percent of all domain name registration. The .com registry accounts for 47 percent of all domain name registrations, according to the company.

VeriSign retains the rights to the .com registry until 2007 when it will have to renew that contract, which provides the company with about $200 million annually in revenue.

Analysts have generally believed that losing the .net registry would have been more of a "headline" risk than a big revenue or profit problem to VeriSign.

VeriSign took over the .net registry in 2000 after it bought Network Solutions, which had been running the domain.

VeriSign, through a spokesman, said it was pleased with ICANN's decision and would continue to make investments in operating Internet domains.

In April, the company said it will add high-powered computer servers that deliver up Web pages to users' browsers over the next two years to meet increased Internet use in emerging markets such as Brazil, India and eastern and central Europe.

VeriSign, which posted about $1.2 billion in revenues in 2004, is also a top provider of ringtones, and processes millions of e-commerce transactions every day for thousands of businesses who effectively outsource their online payment systems to VeriSign.

VeriSign's stock on Thursday closed up 2 cents at $30.82 on Nasdaq. The stock's 52-week high is $36.09.

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[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I would hope that as ICANN sets up these new registrar contracts they would be insisting on certain conditions to protect the integrity of the net. Probably they are not, however. Just allow things to go like status-quo at present which is considered 'good enough'. PAT]