IPOWER has announced the leasing of a brand-new data center facility in Phoenix that has over 7 million dollars of built-in infrastructure including the following amenities:

Security Devices: Proximity card reader & centralized security monitoring, managed access/Smart Card entrance into controlled zone, a video intercom system and HandKey biometric hand scanners

Carrier POP: Diverse fiber access, 5 carriers on-site

Operations Control Center: Central work point, ability to monitor 2000 data points through Datatrax Monitoring System, motion activated video screen, ADT provided Digieye System, VESDA Laser System

Power/Cooling: Directs APS feed, DC/AC power backup, CAT 2000 ekW, 2500 KVA standby generator, 24 Data Air Environmental Control Units powered by three chilled water plants.

“We are very pleased to add this data center to our group of centers,” says Thomas Gorny, CEO of IPOWER. “Its state-of-the-art capabilities will bring an even higher level of service to our customers than ever before.”

Phoenix, Ariz. (August 23, 2006) – IPOWER, Inc., a leading website hosting provider for small businesses, has been named one of the 500 fastest-growing companies in the country by Inc. magazine, which released its 2006 annual ranking of the Inc. 500 on August 23. IPOWER ranked 121 on the list with a three-year sales growth percentage of 801.2%.

The 2006 Inc. 500, as revealed in the September issue of Inc., reported the most robust bunch of companies the magazine has ever compiled, with aggregate revenue of $19.7 billion, up from $16.5 billion last year and $12.9 billion in 2000.

Most important, the 2006 Inc. 500 companies were engines of job growth, having created more than 90,000 jobs since those companies were founded. IPOWER currently has over 300 employees spread across three continents.

Arizona was home to 17 of the fastest growing companies, including The Go Daddy Group (ranked 137), up from 13 companies from the 2005 list. IPOWER is the highest-ranked Phoenixbased business on the list.

This year’s list is the first to include businesses that started up immediately before and after September 11, 2001 - including IPOWER which was started in October of 2001. In total, 104 companies listed on this year’s Inc. 500 were started after 2000.

“If you want to find out which companies are going to change the world, look at the Inc. 500,” said Inc. Editor Jane Berentson. “These are the most innovative, dynamic, fast-growth companies in the nation, the ones coming up with solutions to some of our most intractable ills, creating systems that let us conduct business faster and easier, and manufacturing products we soon discover we can’t live without. The Inc. 500 list is Inc. magazine’s tribute to American business ingenuity and ambition.”

“It’s an honor to be recognized by such a prestigious magazine as Inc.,” said IPOWER CEO & President Thomas Gorny. “I started the company with only a few thousand dollars put on my credit card and a dream. Now, only four short years later, IPOWER has helped over 500,000 small businesses achieve success online. I believe a big reason for our success is based on IPOWER’s commitment to our customers’ needs. We are always looking far ahead to see how IPOWER can better service our customers.”

The 2006 Inc. 500 list measures revenue growth from 2002 through 2005. To qualify, companies had to be U.S.-based, privately held independent - not subsidiaries or divisions of other companies - as of December 31, 2005, and have, and have at least $600,000 in net sales in the
base year.

In addition to the ranking in the Inc. 500, IPOWER CEO Thomas Gorny is included in a story in the same issue regarding Net Promoter Scoring, where he explains how this internal scoring method has helped IPOWER bring an even higher level of service and customer satisfaction to the company’s customer base. The Net Promoter Score is based on the number of customers who are promoters of a company’s products or services minus the number of the company’s detractors.

By Liam Eagle, theWHIR.com

After months spent planning for a public offering of its shares, Web hosting provider and domain registrar Go Daddy (godaddy.com) announced on Tuesday it had withdrawn its registration statement form S-1 with the Securities and Exchange Commission, and had determined not to proceed with the sale of its stock.

The turnaround was not necessarily unexpected. There had been fears surrounding the success of a potential IPO for Go Daddy since the company opened its books in May. While the company has shown remarkable growth in domain names - leaping to the top of the list of the world’s largest registrars in the last year - the company’s growth-encouraging rates have meant Go Daddy has yet to turn a profit.

In describing to employees his reasoning for withdrawing the IPO, Go Daddy CEO Bob Parsons referred to a variety of recent articles highlighting the recent poor performance of IPOs in general, and of technology IPOs in particular.

A popular comparison among analysts was the recent public offering of Vonage, a rapidly growing but not-yet-profitable technology darling whose recent IPO was widely considered a disappointment.

With a bit of “godaddyesque” bluster, Parsons put a particularly confident spin on the news.

“Go Daddy has decided not to proceed with an IPO at this time due to adverse market conditions,” said Parsons in a press release. “With a war and escalating hostilities throughout the Middle East, skyrocketing oil prices and technology stocks once again taking a beating on Wall Street - now just isn’t the right time for us.”

When speculation first began that Go Daddy was considering going public, analysts brought up the possibility that the company might not be dead set on following the process through to the end. In an interview with theWHIR in May, Tier 1 research president Andy Schroepfer said a Go Daddy IPO filing would likely be a “fishing expedition,” seeking feedback or acquisition offers.

“There are a lot of companies that don’t necessarily know if they can be independent companies,” says Schroepfer. “So a lot of them end up going through the process to find out from their bankers what other companies would consider buying them for.”

In a lengthy posting made to his blog on Tuesday, Parsons offered an explanation for why the company had pulled its IPO.

He described the company’s “best quarter ever” and said that market conditions, and some of the ways in which Go Daddy’s reported finances are interpreted had made an IPO seem like a less appealing proposition.

According to Parsons, the SEC’s standards of reporting require the company to account for domain registrations as though they are paid for on a monthly basis by customers. Domain registrations, however, are paid for up front. The result, says Parsons, is that the company’s filings don’t accurately reflect the company’s cash position. “What if you were a cash cow and nobody noticed?” he wrote.

Parsons, as outspoken a CEO as any in the technology business, also said he chafed at the restrictions imposed by the “quiet period” that proceeds an IPO. The restrictions required him to put his “Life Online” radio show on hiatus and limited the freedom he had in posting to his blog.

Ultimately, he said, market conditions were not ready to support a Go Daddy IPO, despite the company having received the “green light” from the SEC.

“Last week when the SEC informed us our filing was accepted as being ready to go, market conditions were a terrible mess,” he wrote. “In fact, inflation worries, say analysts, are bleeding into the tech sector. For all these reasons, I liken the timing of us getting the ‘green light’ to a person being told his car is in perfect condition just before it’s about to be driven into a wall.

“I don’t expect market conditions to correct themselves for sometime. I feel we owe it to ourselves to withdraw our filing until better and more stable times arrive.”

Parsons will return Wednesday night to his Life Online (lifeonline.com) radio program, at which point he will further discuss the decision to reverse the IPO.

Web hosting provider Affinity Internet (affinity.com) announced on Tuesday it has launched the beta release of TrafficZug, a do-it-yourself PPC advertising tool that helps customers create and manage multiple online marketing campaigns in one place.

Launched at the Search Engine Strategies Conference held August 7 to 10 in San Jose, California, TrafficZug enables users to compete in the paid advertising arena with minimal knowledge of search engine marketing. Using simple wizards, language and reporting, TrafficZug performs most of the set up and optimization work on its own.The tool allows customers to manage campaigns on both Google and Yahoo!, and will automatically optimize the customer’s campaign on both networks - all from a single interface. TrafficZug users have access to Affinity’s online marketing staff, which provides strategic guidance on everything from selecting the right keywords to composing effective advertisements.

“We created TrafficZug to eliminate the frustration and time constraint for the small business owner in utilizing online marketing,” says Jim Collins, CEO of Affinity Internet. “For the first time, a small business can develop a marketing plan, meet goals, determine a budget and execute an initial online marketing campaign with a realistic expectation for results in less than half an hour.

Web hosting provider Netfirms (netfirms.com) announced on Friday it has added the Joomla content management system to its suite of software tools.

Netfirms’ hosting customers will now be able to quickly install Joomla from the Web site control panel, which Netfirms says will help Web site developers spend less time installing and configuring the application, and more time creating Web sites. Netfirms says its clustered server technology is ideally suited to serving a database-intensive application such as Joomla.”The Netfirms core mandate is to provide Web site designers and managers with powerful yet easy-to-use tools that will help them succeed on the Web,” says Thomas Savundra, president of Netfirms. “Joomla advances this mission very well, allowing people to easily create and maintain active Web sites.”

Joomla is used by more than 40,000 people around the world to power Web sites. One of Joomla’s strengths lies in the application framework that makes it possible to create add-ons and extensions. Some of Joomla’s extensions include dynamic form builders, business directories, document management, forums and chat software, multimedia galleries and calendars.

Web site building software provider CM4all (cm4all.com) announced on Thursday that Web hosting provider EasyCGI has added the CM4all WebsiteCreator software to its Web hosting platfrm.CM4all says WebsiteCreator provides step-by-step instructions to enable customers to easily create and maintain professional Web sites. Its features include Flash animations, a map generator, blogging tools and a large archive of media. With over 1.5 million users in 12 different languages, CM4all says WebsiteCreator is the most popular online Web site creation software in the world.

“We are delighted that Easy CGI has selected our WebsiteCreator software to satisfy its customers’ Web site building needs, and we look forward to a successful long-term partnership,” says Robert Schovenberg, CEO of CM4all. “Easy CGI represents the latest in a growing list of CM4all’s OEM customer acquisitions in North America.”

Easy CGI will now offer two optional full versions of WebsiteCreator, which can be purchased on demand, as well as bundled versions available with every hosting plan at no additional cost. The eXtreme version of the Easy CGI site builder includes 300 professionally designed templates, a route planner and database functionality.

Web hosting provider IPOWER announced on Thursday that it has leased a brand-new data center with over $7 million of built-in infrastructure.This Phoenix, Arizona data center brings IPOWER’s count up to four facilities. Along with 32,000 square feet of data center space, the facility is equipped with advanced security features including HandKey biometric hand scanners, diverse fiber access with five carriers on site, the ability to monitor 2000 data points through Datatrax Monitoring System and 24 data air environmental control units, which are powered by three chilled water plants.

“We are very pleased to add this data center to our group of centers,” says Thomas Gorny, of IPOWER. “Its state-of-the-art capabilities will bring an even higher level of service to our customers than ever before.”

Founded in October 2001, IPOWER provides Web hosting and Web services for small and medium-sized businesses. IPOWER says it is the fifth largest Web site hosting company worldwide and now has over 500,000 customer accounts in over 100 countries.

Web hosting provider LunarPages announced on Friday it has cut the price on additional domain names from $14.95 to $2.99 each for a limited time for new and existing customers.

LunarPages says the industry has become extremely competitive recently and that many Web hosts have been dropping their prices to the point that they are running at a loss and are resorting to overselling.The company says customers have been surprised by its most recent offer, especially since it already provides a free domain for life. Domains purchased during this offer will also include renewals at the original price for as long as the customer is hosted with the company.

“We won’t compromise our business model, server stability or uptime by overselling which will leave our customers feeling cheated and forced to upgrade to a dedicated server,” says Amy Armitage of Lunarpages. “To remain competitive we have found another way to enhance our offerings, without compromising the level of service and support that has earned us the reputation as leaders and veterans in the Web hosting industry. Low priced domain names and partnerships with leading companies enable us to give back to our customers without resulting in a price increase to them.”

Web hosting provider 1and1 Internet (1and1.com) announced on Friday it is offering 25 percent off all Linux and Microsoft shared hosting packages for one year.

1and1 offers four shared hosting packages including the Beginner, Home, Business and Developer packages. The Home package, for example, will now be $45 for one year with no extra costs for up to two personal domains. The Business package includes three domains for $90 for a full year term.”This is a tremendous offer especially for a small or medium sized business,” says Andreas Gauger, chairman of 1and1 Internet. “So many businesses think that they can’t afford a world-class Web site. We’re here to show them that it’s possible, inexpensive and will enable any business to compete in their marketplace.”

The discount is only valid for the first year, and beginning with the second year of subscription, normal fees will be charged. The offer is good from July 31 until September 30.

April 18, 2006 — Shared Web hosting provider PowWeb announced on Monday that it had been acquired by The Endurance International Group (enduranceinternational.com), which owns several other Web hosting firms, including BizLand and FatCow.

Financial details of the sale were not disclosed, but the companies say Endurance will maintain the PowWeb brand, as well as its popular online forums.”We’re very excited to work with an online community as dynamic and engaging as PowWeb’s,” says Steve Sydness, CEO of Endurance. “Listening and responding to customer feedback is a hallmark of Endurance. The PowWeb forums will provide a great vehicle for staying close to our customers.”

PowWeb CEO Andrew Te says the company is about to begin the process of migrating customer Web sites and email to a new hosting platform that employs the company’s proprietary load-balanced hosting technology. He says the new platform will support all its customer sites from a single massively shared hosting pool, which will provide greater redundancy.

“While its ownership has changed, PowWeb’s commitment to providing high-quality, rock-solid hosting solutions is stronger than ever,” says Te.