What Was The Deal With NQ.com?

I read a couple of SEC filings from publicly traded NetQin Mobile, Inc. that discusses the domain name  NQ.com, although some of the language is a bit confusing to me and I don’t know the exact value of the deal or what type of transaction occurred.

The company that reported the transaction, NetQin Mobile, trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the matching NQ symbol, and the corporate website can be found on NQ.com. Just recently, the company announced a name change to NQ Mobile.

According to a Form 20-F filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), NetQin Mobile reported, “Net cash used in investing activities amounted to $47.1 million in 2011, primarily attributable to net placement of term deposits of $47.1 million and purchase of domain name use right (www.nq.com) of $1.6 million, partially offset by proceeds from the repayment of the advance to a mobile payment service provider of $2.2 million.

According to a second filing found on the SEC website, “In July 2011, the Company purchased a domain name NQ.com from a third party (the “Licensor”) with a consideration of US$1,550. The Company has been granted an exclusive license for the use of the domain name for ten years from July 2011 to July 2021. Unless renewed, upon the expiration or earlier termination of this agreement, the Licensor shall have the right to license the domain name to any other party as the Licensor desires. However, if the Licensor intends to transfer the domain name to another party, the Licensor must first offer the domain name to the Company for purchase. If the Company decides not to purchase the domain name, Licensor may then transfer the domain name to a third party.”

It would be interesting to know more details about what was transacted and what the value of NQ.com is/was at the time of the filings.  DNJournal reported  that NQ.com sold for $27,000 on Afternic in 2004.

Thanks to  George Kirikos  for the tip.

Elliot Silver
Elliot Silver
About The Author: Elliot Silver is an Internet entrepreneur and publisher of DomainInvesting.com. Elliot is also the founder and President of Top Notch Domains, LLC, a company that has closed eight figures in deals. Please read the DomainInvesting.com Terms of Use page for additional information about the publisher, website comment policy, disclosures, and conflicts of interest. Reach out to Elliot: Twitter | Facebook | LinkedIn

3 COMMENTS

  1. Cant wait to see what happened here. Cant really make sense of what they’re saying. A 10 year license with an option to buy or something? I was the one who sold nq.com to a company using it as ‘nexus quotient’ back in 04 as reported. Hope they did well off it!

  2. My guess is that the sale price was $1,550,000.

    My guess is:

    1st source reported the actual (rounded) #

    2nd source was in thousands (1,550 * 1,000 = $1,550,000)

    • @ Michael

      There’s some sense in that, but this doesn’t make sense if there was a sale:

      “Company has been granted an exclusive license for the use of the domain name for ten years from July 2011 to July 2021. Unless renewed, upon the expiration or earlier termination of this agreement, the Licensor shall have the right to license the domain name to any other party as the Licensor desires. However, if the Licensor intends to transfer the domain name to another party, the Licensor must first offer the domain name to the Company for purchase. If the Company decides not to purchase the domain name, Licensor may then transfer the domain name to a third party.””

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