Tesla.com now forwards to TeslaMotors.com.
Tesla Motors (NASDAQ:TSLA) has finally acquired the Tesla.com domain name. It is now forwarding Tesla.com to TeslaMotors.com.
The domain name was registered in 1992, well before the company was formed. The earliest whois record at DomainTools shows that the same person has owned the domain name since at least 2002, and may have been the original registrant. The domain name was registered to Stu Grossman of SG Consulting in California. (I will call him at a reasonable hour California time to inquire.)
In 2005, domain name attorney John Berryhill helped Grossman defend his domain name in a UDRP, brought by an entirely different company named Tesla.
It has long been a question on many Tesla enthusiasts’ minds: when would the company acquire the Tesla.com domain name? It became more important when Tesla announced it was expanding beyond autos and into home batteries with its Tesla Powerwall. TeslaMotors.com doesn’t make much sense for selling non-motors batteries.
As someone who frequently visits the Tesla website, I can attest that I still type in Tesla.com by accident quite often.
The updated Tesla whois record is below, which shows Tesla’s brand protection registrar MarkMonitor and its DNStination company as the owner:
5 to 10 million. This will come out later in Q. No doubt it sold in this area. It will make the top 10 of all time. Could of been more.
DM
My guess is under 1M and because the transaction is so small, we may never see the price in TSLA report. The guy hated the attention the domain got (see namepros) and Tesla played hard for many years not caving in. I would say the owner broke down and let it go, otherwise Tesla would have not bought.
It will be in this are 5 – 10 million. They tried to get it before knew how important it was then FAILED. At that point the name became 10x more than what is was worth.
Nor do they own powerwall.com or teslahomebattery.com, they should. Seems people use home battery as much or more as powerwall to describe it.
Funny! We were just discussing this last week.
$18 Million