You probably didn't see this one coming! We have learned that Flippa.com a popular marketplace for buying and selling websites, domains, and apps, has acquired premium domain name brokerage company, Domain Holdings Group, for an undisclosed price. A joint release from leaders of the two companies, Flippa's Founder Mark Harbottle, and DomainHoldings' Co-Founder John Ferber, said the combined entities are projected to ring up $70 million in sales over the next 12 months, putting them in position to compete with  aftermarket giants Sedo and Go Daddy.

Harbottle, who also founded 99Designs.com, said, "When you take a dominant marketplace like Flippa.com and add the most respected outbound sales teams in the domain name space, you have a platform for selling digital assets that will be unrivaled in the market.” We have been told that the DomainHoldings brand will be retained with few changes expected other than adding staff to help drive continued growth. 

Ferber is famous for founding and selling Advertising.com to America Online for nearly $500 million in 2004 before joining forces with Chad Folkening to launch Domain Holdings in 2010. The company booked nearly $31 million in sales last year. Ferber said, "We’re thrilled for the Domain Holdings team to join Flippa. We’ve been watching the Flippa marketplace go from strength to strength strength and  the combination of these two companies will create a powerful sales platform for domain names and web sites that will be hard to beat."

Ferber and Folkening founded another company, Bidtellect, in 2011 that has made a big splash in the rapidly growing field of native advertising, so this deal will also allow them to focus on continuing to grow that business.

Flippa Founder Mark Harbottle

 Domain Holdings Co-Founder John Ferber