{"id":3452,"date":"2013-09-19T16:34:57","date_gmt":"2013-09-19T20:34:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/acro.net\/blog\/?p=3452"},"modified":"2013-09-19T16:46:55","modified_gmt":"2013-09-19T20:46:55","slug":"acquisitions-and-mergers-bring-layoffs-and-executive-control","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acro.net\/blog\/acquisitions-and-mergers-bring-layoffs-and-executive-control\/","title":{"rendered":"Acquisitions and mergers bring layoffs and executive control"},"content":{"rendered":"

Having worked for start-ups and companies that were eventually acquired by others, or merged with competitors, I can safely say that nothing good ever comes from such corporate fusions.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The acquisition of Afternic<\/strong> by GoDaddy<\/strong> is the big news of the day. It signifies the end of an era for Afternic, which stood out, in my book, as a professional, energetic marketplace that remained untainted by the various domain industry scandals.<\/p>\n

Things will definitely change, with GoDaddy aggressively<\/strong> entering an era where the use of cheesy, “kick-ass<\/em>” movie icons, supposedly makes more sense than the use of “girl next door” female promoters.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, GoDaddy already operates a domain auction marketplace, TDNAM<\/strong>, and through its alliance with Sedo<\/strong> they have turned it into a fused bazaar of lowball offers<\/strong> and unresponsive bidders with an attitude.<\/p>\n

Still, GoDaddy maintains that Afternic will continue its independent function as a domain selling platform; however, realistically this is not going to happen in the long run. Executives of the mother company will definitely have the final say; after all, the generous amount of cash that GoDaddy surely paid for Afternic dictates who makes decisions.<\/p>\n

Mergers and acquisitions lead to layoffs, corporate conspiracies and ego-clashing; the loser is eventually the customer<\/strong> who has one less option than before – that’s one step closer to a monopolistic industry.<\/p>\n

As the domain industry evolves, it will go through the same hoops and evolutionary stages of the tech sector and other industries.<\/p>\n

Let’s hope that lessons of the past will be utilized in the process, or the next big bang might involve shifting away from current industry paradigms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Having worked for start-ups and companies that were eventually acquired by others, or merged with competitors, I can safely say that nothing good ever comes from such corporate fusions. The acquisition of Afternic by GoDaddy is the big news of the day. It signifies the end of an era for Afternic, which stood out, in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business","entry"],"yoast_head":"\nAcquisitions and mergers bring layoffs and executive control - Acro.net - A Domain Investing Blog by Theo Develegas<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/acro.net\/blog\/acquisitions-and-mergers-bring-layoffs-and-executive-control\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Acquisitions and mergers bring layoffs and executive control - Acro.net - A Domain Investing Blog by Theo Develegas\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Having worked for start-ups and companies that were eventually acquired by others, or merged with competitors, I can safely say that nothing good ever comes from such corporate fusions. 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