Dyn (company)

Dyn was created as a community-led student project by Jeremy Hitchcock, Tom Daly, Tim Wilde and Chris Reinhardt during their undergraduate studies at Worcester Polytechnic Institute.[4] Originally, Dyn enabled students to access lab computers and print documents remotely. The project then moved towards domain name system (DNS) services. The first iteration was a free dynamic DNS service known as DynDNS.[5] The project required $25,000 to stay open, and raised over $40,000.[5]

The donation based model continued until 2002, and stopped with a launch of "donator-only" DNS services.[6] Later, a premium service called the DynECT Managed DNS Platform became available in 2008.,[7] with the hiring of Kyle York, Gray Chynoweth and Cory von Wallenstein, as the business began to scale.

In 2011, Dyn opened an office in London, and it eventually moved its EMEA headquarters to Brighton.[8] In the same year, Dyn opened its new headquarters in Manchester, New Hampshire, United States.[9]

In October 2012, Dyn completed a Series A round of venture capital funding totaling US$ 38 million from North Bridge Venture Partners.[10] Prior to the investment from North Bridge, the company had been self funded.[11]

In August 2013, Dyn launched its annual geek summer camp event, a business conference for the Internet performance industry.[12]

In April 2014, Dyn announced the discontinuation of its free hostname services effective May 7.[13][14]

In September 2014, Dyn launched Dyn Internet Intelligence, a SaaS-based product.[15]

In May 2016, Dyn obtained further equity funding of US$50 million from Pamplona Capital Management.[16] Also in May 2016, Dyn launched its platform for internet performance management.[16] Total funding of $100M.

In October 2016, Colin Doherty was appointed the company’s CEO.[17]

The company scaled to approximately $100M in annual recurring revenue (ARR) prior to exit.[18]

On November 21, 2016, Dyn announced that it had agreed to be acquired by Oracle Corporation for 600 million USD.[19][20][21]

In June 2018, Oracle released the Internet Intelligence Map, a free tool that provides data about worldwide Internet traffic and disruptions.[22] The map uses the Internet Intelligence technology Oracle acquired from Dyn.[23]

Oracle and Oracle Dyn continue to be a technology leader in the New Hampshire economy.[24]

In June 2019, Oracle announced Dyn DNS services would be shutting down in 2020, with customers receiving a notice via email. "Oracle is announcing the end-of-life for the free Standard DNS service in favor of the enhanced, paid subscription version on the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure platform. On May 31, 2020, the “EOL Date”, the Standard DNS will be retired and will no longer be available."[25] Commercial clients will be migrated to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, with Dyn's free service (DynDNS or DDNS) ceasing operations completely.[26] Many customers publicly shared[27][28] they would not be migrating to OCI and considering alternatives such as NS1, Constellix, DNS Made Easy, Cloudflare, Verisign, and Rackspace.[29][30][31] In addition to the technical changes, employees at Dyn's Manchester, New Hampshire location were laid off and the office space was put up for rent by the building owner.[32]

Many people were upset about this, specifically because they had donated to Dyn in its early days in exchange for 'free for life' service which Oracle is no longer recognizing. "We truly appreciate your support throughout the years. While we are discontinuing the availability of services received at no-cost, you may be surprised by how affordable the DNS service is within OCI along with outstanding capabilities with this service."[3]

A 2019 New Business Review article highlights the Dyn effect on the Manchester, New Hampshire economy and culture[33]

• Dyn acquired three companies during 2010: EveryDNS,[37] EditDNS,[38] and SendLabs.[39]
• In September 2012, Dyn acquired the SEO/SEM & Ecommerce Development parts of Incutio LTD.[40] They also acquired long time DNS provider TZO.[41]
• On January 2, 2013, Dyn acquired Web performance monitoring company Verelo.[42]
• On May 13, 2013, Dyn acquired mobile dashboard app startup Trendslide.[43]
• On December 23, 2013, Dyn acquired ReadyStatus, a tool that notifies customers of planned and unplanned service interruptions.[44]
• On March 26, 2014 Dyn acquired Nettica, a US-based managed DNS provider.[45]
• On May 20, 2014, Dyn acquired Renesys, specialist in monitoring the Internet to provide data about cloud services, connectivity and potential performance issues.[46]
• On February 15, 2018, Oracle announced an agreement to acquire Zenedge, a Florida-based web application security company.[47] The acquisition closed on March 5, 2018, and Zenedge became part of the Oracle Dyn Global Business Unit.[48]

• DNS hosting service
• Public recursive name servers
• Dynamic DNS
• List of managed DNS providers

• Official website