Directi

Directi
Industry	Internet, Registrar
Founded	1998 (1998)
Founder	Bhavin Turakhia Divyank Turakhia
Headquarters	Directiplex, Old Nagardas Road, Andheri (East), Mumbai, Maharashtra 400069
Key people	Bhavin Turakhia, Founder and CEO Divyank Turakhia, Co-founder and President Vishal Manjalani, Director Andrew Allemann, Business Development Sandeep Ramchandani, Dir. Strategic Partnerships
Revenue	INR300+ billion
Owner	Endurance International Group
Number of employees	1000+
Website	Directi.com

Directi is an Internet domain name registrar company founded in 1998 by Bhavin Turakhia, who single-handedly wrote an advanced Fraud-detection algorithm, and was instrumental in the adoption of the 70-day grace period for businesses concerned with the registry of IANA and ICANN.^[1]Directi is the first ICANN accredited registrar in India.^[2] The head office of Directi is in Mumbai, India, with subdivision offices in Delhi and Bangalore; Xiamen, China; Ras al Khaimah, United Arab Emirates; and in Queensland, Australia.^[3]

Directi is valued at over $300 million,^[4] and has more than 1,000 employees. The company serves over 1,000,000 customers and has more than 50,000 channel partners, which is growing at a rate of 120% per annum. Directi services include communication and collaboration apps, social networking software, instant messaging, context analysis engines, anti-spam and antivirus solutions, large-scale billing and provisioning platforms, traffic monetization solutions, online advertising solutions, DNS management products, Linux and Windows server management software, and web hosting control panels.^[5]

Directi has five offices in four countries.^[6]

New gTLD applications

In a press release, Directi announced its more than $30 million investment for its application for 31 new generic top level domain names (gTLDs) with ICANN's new Generic top level domain expansion program. The company established Radix to serve as the applicant and eventual registry operator for all the proposed 31 gTLDs, which are: .web, .shop, .bank, .law, .music, .news, .blog, .movie, .baby, .store, .doctor, .hotel, .play, .home, .site, .website, .click, .online, .one, .ping, .space, .world, .press, .chat, .city, .deals, .insurance, .loans, .app, .host and .hosting, while Directi`s traditional operations retain registry services by BigRock and PDR Ltd.^[7]

Directi CEO Bhavin Turakhia anticipated string contention on the domain name strings. He said that his company is open to strategic partnerships with other parties. He said, "I expect there to be contention in all of them. Whether they will end up going to auction… we’re completely open to strategic partnerships with other industry players who we believe can add value and join hands with us, based on merit. We’ll be evaluating this on a case by case basis."^[8]

Subsidiaries

Directi has many subsidiary businesses, both wholly owned, and JSCs, including:

PDR Ltd. doing business as publicdomainregistry.com - Domain name registrar based in India^[9]^[10]
LogicBoxes^[11] - LogicBoxes provides private label domain registration and web hosting solutions. Its services include registry exchange, web hosting, email hosting, and website builder.
ResellerClub^[11] - ResellerClub offers domain registration (gTLDs and ccTLDs), Linux and Windows hosting, mail hosting, mail anti-spam and antivirus, SSL, etc.
WebHosting.Info^[11] - Webhosting.Info offers information about the various domain registrars worldwide, a forum for discussions about domain, and tips and news related to domain hosting.
Skenzo^[11] - Skenzo provides traffic monetization and domain parking services.
BigRock^[12] - BigRock provides web hosting solutions for small businesses, professionals and individuals.^[11]
Radix^[11] - In March 2012, it was announced that Directi would be launching a new gTLD entity that would be applying for and running new extensions. Radix is partnered with ARI Registry Services for its technical, registry needs. It was not announced at that time what gTLDs Radix would be applying for, but it was clear that they intended to put together a substantial portfolio.^[13]
.pw The Professional Web^[11] - Directi has relaunched the .pw ccTLD as an Open ccTLD, targeting a professional audience with the acronym "Professional Web". It became the company's first active experience as a TLD registry.

Directi also manages second level domains in the .pw namespace. .pw is the ccTLD for Palau. There is no registration process for higher level domain names in that namespace.

Directi`s corporate and operational structure is first-class, and many opportunities for revenue-generation are made available through interaction between Directi-Group companies.

CodeChef is a non-profit initiative by directi, for conducting programming contests. It hosts online programming contests every month. It also hosts various events and trainings related to programming.

Awards

Directi has won the PinkSlip Choice Award for the “most innovative recruitment advertisement" in 2008.
Directi was ranked 13th in the Deloitte and Touche Fast 50 list in 2007.^[14]

Directiplex

Directiplex is a seven-floor facility that has been built to meet the increasing needs of Directi. It is has an area of 120,000 square feet and has the capacity for 1500 employees. Directiplex has an employee restaurant and a gaming center in the building. It was inaugurated in 2009.^[15]

References