The second Applicant Auction is just a few weeks away, and we've been hard at work finalizing the details. We're excited to see so many applicants ready to participate, and wanted to share a few details about our progress toward the big day:

In early June, the first Applicant Auction resolved contention for 6 contested gTLDs. The successful outcome of that auction has generated a great deal of interest from other applicants, and Innovative Auctions is expecting a big turnout in our next auction, to be held on August 13th. For more than half of the contested applications, at least one applicant is ready to resolve contention via our auction. We will be holding 2 workshops at ICANN 47 in Durban

The Applicant Auction team will be coming to Durban, July 14th-18th for ICANN 47 and we'd love to meet with as many applicants as possible. Additionally, we'll be holding workshops on July 15th and 17th.

We're pleased to announce that the first Applicant Auction has come to a successful finish! As of this morning, the winners are now the only remaining applicants for the six contested strings.

 After last week's successful auction, we have received enormous interest from applicants about participating in future auctions. Our team is thrilled to see such a positive response from the community, and we're growing our team to support the increased demand for clear, transparent auctions. We're excited to announce that Patri Friedman is joining us as the 11th member of our team. He will initially be in charge of the auction user experience and documentation, as well as managing our tools for streamlining and scaling the auction qualification and settlement process.