According to imstilljosh.com, who seems to be involved with the .HIV registry, the new gTLD string .HIV is being transferred to Uniregistry.
“”Today, Uniregistry takes over the lead in this unique journey to use a top-level domain to promote a social good. The dotHIV charity will continue its work for .hiv and focus on community support. The creative agency thjnk from Hamburg, Germany, longstanding partner of the initiative, will continue to work on behalf of the .hiv top-level domain, exploring new and existing opportunities for social change.”
Frank Schilling is quoted as saying:
“By assuming the registry operations of .hiv, we are taking our core skills and putting them at the service of one of the most urgent challenges of humankind, the United Nations has reconfirmed the opportunities to end the global AIDS epidemic within our lifetime. At Uniregistry, we want to be a part of this ambitious endeavor.”
.hiv will maintain its charitable nature under its new ownership.
“Of course, Uniregistry is a for-profit company. But with .hiv, we act as a social enterprise”, says Frank Schilling. “It is the social mission that will guide the operation of this special TLD.”
.HIV was scheduled to go to an auction a few months ago with a reserve price of $200,000 but no one showed up at the auction to buy.
Terms of the deal were not announced.
Congrats to Uniregistry on another new gTLD
Rubens Kuhl says
“The two organizations plan to conclude the transition prior to December 1st 2015” – Unfortunately the ICANN transition process is not that fast.
Carolin S. says
Hi Rubens, we’ve started into the technical transition yesterday, and ICANN does an excellent job at supporting the process and sticking to timelines. December 1st is a very likely date.
Rubens Kuhl says
All other registries that went thru both a technical transition and an assignment, as in this case, complained a lot about lack of timeliness. If they manage to do .hiv transition fast, that would be a first. If that really happens, it will be great to see ICANN improving a suboptimal process.
Eric Lyon says
Excellent move. Looking forward to seeing how the charity aspects pan out.
h4ck3r says
Is there a reason that Uniregistry couldn’t just provide the infrastructure and skills on an outsource basis?
I’m not second guessing the actual reasoning 🙂