CentralNic Group PLC is a British multinational internet services holding company[1] headquartered in London, United Kingdom.[2] Its subsidiaries provide domain name registry[3] and registrar services,[4] in addition to associated products and services, including web hosting, brand management, and domain parking.[5]
CentralNic Group PLC is listed within the AIM market on the London Stock Exchange.
In 2000, Stephen Dyer founded CentralNic[6] as a successor organisation to NomiNation, a company which he had founded in 1995.[7]
In 2013, CentralNic announced[8] that it planned to float on the Alternative Investment Market of the London Stock Exchange.
In early 2014, CentralNic acquired DomiNIC GmbH.[9]
In 2014, CentralNic acquired retail domain name registrar Internet.BS, for US$7.5m, adding to its expanding Registrar Portfolio.[10]
In 2015, CentralNic acquired Instra Corp and quickly integrated this retail and corporate domain name registrar into its portfolio.[11]
In 2018, CentralNic acquired the ccTLD for Slovakia (.sk) in a €26m deal.[12]
On 16 July 2018 CentralNic announced a merger with KeyDrive Group in a reverse takeover (according to AIM rules of the London Stock Exchange).[13]
On 6 September 2018 CentralNic acquired Romania and Brazil-focused registrar and domain hosting provider GlobeHosting Inc. for a consideration of €2.56 million.[14]
On 20 May 2019 CentralNic announced plans to acquire the leading Australian and New Zealand domain name and hosting reseller business TPP Wholesale for $24m AUD.[15]
On 1 July 2019 CentralNic acquired international domain name reseller platform Hexonet Group for up to €10 million.[16]
On 7 August 2019 CentralNic acquired international domain name retailer Ideegeo Group Ltd ("Ideegeo") for up to NZD$5.2 million (c.$3.4m USD).[17]
In November 2019 CentralNic acquired Team Internet from Matomy Media for $48m.[18]
In September 2020 CentralNic announced that it would acquire the Zeropark and Voluum businesses of Polish company Codewise for $36m.[19] The deal was completed in November 2020.
In January 2021 CentralNic acquired french brand protection registrar Safebrands for $4.4m.[20]
CentralNic Ltd, the domain name registry subsidiary of CentralNic Group PLC, registers second-level domains (SLDs) under these country code top-level domains (ccTLDs):[22]
CentralNic registers SLDs under these [new] generic top-level domain (gTLDs):[23]
CentralNic registers subdomains under these unofficial second-level domains (SLDs):
None of these domains is an official SLD. Therefore, this part of CentralNic's operation is a private sub-domain registry.
These subdomains have been relatively popular and sold across a wide range of domain registrars globally, including GoDaddy, Alibaba, Network Solutions, eNom, Webfusion, GMO Internet, Inc., Gandi, Key Systems, Directi, InternetX, and many others.[24]