Gandi SAS (''Gestion et Attribution des Noms de Domaine sur Internet'' – "Management and Allocation of Domain Names on the Internet") is a French company providing

domain name In the Internet, a domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority, or control. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services, and more. ...

registration, web hosting, and related services. The company's main office is in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

History

Gandi was founded as a domain registrar in April 2000 by Valentin Lacambre, Laurent Chemla, Pierre Beyssac and David Nahmias. In 2005 following internal struggles in management, ownership and management of Gandi was sold to a team led by Stephan Ramoin (formerly of MultiMania/

Lycos Lycos, Inc. (stylized as LYCOS), is a web search engine and web portal established in 1994, spun out of Carnegie Mellon University. Lycos also encompasses a network of email, web hosting, social networking, and entertainment websites. The company ...

), and investors Joe White, Eirik Pettersen (co-founders of the online website building service Moonfruit), and Warren Stephens. In 2008, Gandi launched a Xen-based VPS cloud hosting service, based on a system of "shares" and scalable resources that can be adjusted in real time. In 2010 the company created a subsidiary in the US, opening a data center in downtown

Baltimore Baltimore is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland. With a population of 585,708 at the 2020 census and estimated at 568,271 in 2024, it is the 30th-most populous U.S. city. The Baltimore metropolitan area is the 20th-large ...

Phoenix, Arizona Phoenix ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of cities and towns in Arizona#List of cities and towns, most populous city of the U.S. state of Arizona. With over 1.6 million residents at the 2020 census, it is the ...

and business offices in

San Francisco, California San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

, as well as creating a customer support center in the US, which until then had been exclusively operated out of Paris, France at

Place de la Nation The Place de la Nation (; formerly the Place du Trône , subsequently the Place du Trône-Renversé during the French Revolution) is a circle on the eastern side of Paris, between the Place de la Bastille and the Bois de Vincennes, on the bo ...

. In late 2011, Gandi.net was the 25th largest registrar in terms of the number of domains registered. On 31 July 2014,

Amazon Web Services Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) is a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Amazon that provides Software as a service, on-demand cloud computing computing platform, platforms and Application programming interface, APIs to individuals, companies, and gover ...

partnered with Gandi and announced the ability to register domains directly through their Route 53 Service. On 28 February 2019, Gandi CEO Stephan Ramoin announced that private equity firm Montefiore Investment had acquired the company. In February 2023, Gandi was acquired by Total Webhosting Solutions, forming a new brand, Your.Online. In June, the company announced drastic price increases, including a new monthly fee for mailboxes previously included for free.

Service

Domain registrar

Gandi is mostly known as a

domain name registrar A domain name registrar is a company, person, or office that manages the reservation of Internet domain names. A domain name registrar must be accredited by a generic top-level domain (gTLD) Domain name registry, registry or a country code top-l ...

Email services

Gandi is also known for its "Gandi mail" offering, which includes some productivity software and allows to use

open source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

software Roundcube as

webmail Webmail (or web-based email) is an email service that can be accessed using a standard web browser. It contrasts with email service accessible through a specialised email client software. Additionally, many internet service providers (ISP) prov ...

interface.

Business model

Gandi does not advertise, relying primarily on "word of mouth" recommendations from existing customers. Until 2019, the company didn't distribute profits nor take debts, but reinvested all its margins in the business. The company has a program to provide funds and/or promotion to projects and organizations that meet its criteria of "concrete", "open", and "alternative". It uses and advocates for

open-source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use and view the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open source model is a decentrali ...

software, and since September 2010 has supported

Creative Commons Creative Commons (CC) is an American non-profit organization and international network devoted to educational access and expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has release ...

, providing them with free domain registrations and renewals, as well as VPS services. Other projects that Gandi supports include (but not limited to) the

Electronic Frontier Foundation The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an American international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1990 to promote Internet civil liberties. It provides funds for legal defense in court, ...

Students for Free Culture Students for Free Culture, formerly known as FreeCulture.org, is an international student organization working to promote free culture ideals, such as cultural participation and access to information. It was inspired by the work of former Stanfo ...

The Spamhaus Project The Spamhaus Project is an international organisation based in the Principality of Andorra, founded in 1998 by Steve Linford to track email spammers and spam-related activity. The name ''spamhaus'', a pseudo-German expression, was coined by Li ...

Debian Debian () is a free and open-source software, free and open source Linux distribution, developed by the Debian Project, which was established by Ian Murdock in August 1993. Debian is one of the oldest operating systems based on the Linux kerne ...

Let's Encrypt Let's Encrypt is a Non-profit organisation, non-profit certificate authority run by Internet Security Research Group (ISRG) that provides X.509 public key certificate, certificates for Transport Layer Security (TLS) encryption at no charge. It is ...

Ubuntu Ubuntu ( ) is a Linux distribution based on Debian and composed primarily of free and open-source software. Developed by the British company Canonical (company), Canonical and a community of contributors under a Meritocracy, meritocratic gover ...

GNOME A gnome () is a mythological creature and diminutive spirit in Renaissance magic and alchemy, introduced by Paracelsus in the 16th century and widely adopted by authors, including those of modern fantasy literature. They are typically depict ...

FreeBSD FreeBSD is a free-software Unix-like operating system descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD). The first version was released in 1993 developed from 386BSD, one of the first fully functional and free Unix clones on affordable ...

, Dotclear,

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, Paris Web,

World Wide Fund for Nature The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) is a Swiss-based international non-governmental organization founded in 1961 that works in the field of wilderness preservation and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It was formerly named th ...

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (SSCS) is a non-profit, marine conservation activism organization based in Friday Harbor, Washington, Friday Harbor on San Juan Island, Washington, in the United States. Sea Shepherd employs direct action t ...

VideoLAN VideoLAN is a Nonprofit organization, non-profit organization which software development, develops software for playing video and other media formats. It originally developed two computer program, programs for media streaming media, streaming, ...

, Adie,

Canard PC ''Canard PC'' is an independent magazine founded in France in 2003 devoted to PC gaming and published monthly. The title ''Canard PC'' is a paronym, derived from ''Canard WC'', which is the French name for Toilet Duck. ''Canard PC''s independe ...

International Federation for Human Rights The International Federation for Human Rights (; FIDH) is a non-governmental federation for human rights organizations. Founded in 1922, FIDH is the third oldest international human rights organization worldwide after Anti-Slavery International ...

(FIDH),

Demotix Demotix was a photo agency that enabled freelance photojournalists to license their photos to mainstream media organisations, charities, and stock image buyers. Initially conceived as a free speech platform to allow local journalists to report ...

GoodPlanet The GoodPlanet Foundation is a non-governmental organization founded by Yann Arthus-Bertrand in 2005, supporting ecology and sustainable development. Activities The GoodPlanet Foundation is mainly concerned with the distribution of pedagogic ...

Jamendo Jamendo is a Luxembourg-based music website and an open community of independent artists and music lovers. A subsidiary of Belgian company Llama Group, and Independent Management Entity (IME) since 2019. Originally, Jamendo was a music platform ...

, In Libro Veritas, Arrêt sur Images le retour,

Software Freedom Conservancy Software Freedom Conservancy, Inc. (also known as "Conservancy") is an organization that provides a Nonprofit organization, non-profit home, infrastructure support, and legal support for free software, free and open source software projects. The ...

, Geeklist,

FlISoL FLISoL, an acronym for Festival Latinoamericano de Instalación de Software Libre (Latin American free software Installfest, install fest), is the biggest event for spreading ''Software Libre, free software'' since 2005, performed simultaneously i ...

, Wikiotics, and FluxBB.

References

{{WebManTools Blog hosting services French companies established in 2000 Companies based in Paris Domain name registrars Information technology companies of France Web hosting