Until recently all .nz domains were registered with Domainz, which is owned by non-profit organisation InternetNZ. In December last year InternetNZ restructured the company, creating .nz Registry Services to act as the registry and transforming Domainz into a retail registrar. In May this year, Domainz was advertised for sale.
"There has been a robust response from interested parties," Timothy Russell, from Deloitte NZ, the party chosen to handle the sale, told ZDNet Australia. "Interest came from New Zealand, Australia, Asia Pacific and the US. The largest country represented by enquirers is NZ."
Of the 12 bidders for the company at least two were Australian businesses. MelbourneIT was approached by Deloitte NZ and were interested enough to bid for the business.
"We have always said we will examine any potential acquisition to see if it will fit with our overall strategy," Tom Valenta, spokesperson for MelbourneIT told ZDNet Australia, stressing that MelbourneIT was only one of a number of vendors that were approached. "We already get 60 percent of our revenue from International markets."
TPP Internet, another accredited registrar, is also involved in bidding for Domainz.
However, not all companies who were approached considered the NZ registrar a good buy. "We have been approached, and decided it's not really an opportunity," Vic Cinc, CEO of registrar Enetica told ZDNet Australia. "It's another one of these shrinking monopolies and it would be hard to turn it around."
NetRegistry also decided it was happier to compete with Domainz in the New Zealand marketplace rather than buy it. "We had a look at it to be honest," NetRegistry CEO Larry Bloch told ZDNet Australia. "Part of the difficulty is that we don't see the Domainz brand as having a whole lot of value."
Bloch said Domainz had historical value as an ex-monopoly, but was concerned over the history of poor service by the company. "It's got significant marketshare, but we're concerned whether their marketshare will be maintained."
Australia's registry, Ausregistry, also had a look at the business. "Ultimately we saw there were a few holes there and decided to keep our distance," Ausregistry spokesperson Adrian Kinderis told ZDNet Australia. "It wasn't a compelling business to be honest."
He said Domainz was in the same situation as MelbourneIT, having been a monopoly and now operating in a competitive environment, but hadn't coped with the situation as well as MelbourneIT.
"They've lost a lot of market share with the introduction of competition," he said.
