In Private equity firms KKR & Co., Silver Lake Partners and a third investor are close to striking a deal that could see them buy the owner of GoDaddy.com, the site that registers Internet domain names for commercial and private users. Sources familiar with the matter have revealed that the deal could be for more than $2 billion.
The deal has not been signed yet, but some kind of announcement is expected by next week. It was in September 2010 that the Internet domain registration and Web hosting site, GoDaddy had put itself up for sale. The company had hired a boutique investment bank, Qatalyst Partners to advise it during the process of finding a suitable buyer.
GoDaddy has steady cash flows from the monthly fees that users pay the company for managing their domains, websites, and in some cases things like e-commerce, security and other services involved in management of online presence.
Bob Parsons, who had founded GoDaddy in 1997, continues to be its owner and chief executive. The recent decision by ICANN to allow any word to be used as a domain extension, such as .apple or .iphone or .ibm, has definitely had the effect of boosting GoDaddys valuation.
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