In the same post, he stated that if he sold the domain, he would make a significant payment to Sal Khan and Khan Academy.
Dharmesh Shah, co-founder of HubSpot, claims to have purchased the domain name ‘chat.com’ for more than $10 million and sold it for a profit of $250,000. However, he has donated the profits to Sal Khan and Khan Academy.
Shah is an American entrepreneur of Indian ancestry who co-founded HubSpot, a major inbound marketing and sales software firm, in 2006. The corporation is traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) and has a market capitalization of more than $24 billion.
Shah purchased the domain name chat.com and redirected it to a LinkedIn article; he did not launch any new products with the domain name.
“The reason I bought chat.com is simple: I believe Chat-based UX (#ChatUX) is the next big thing in software,” stated the LinkedIn article that chat.com led users to. Communicating with computers/software via a natural language interface is far more natural. This is made possible through Generative Artificial Intelligence.“
“chat.com is absolutely beautiful in terms of simplicity, shortness, and being totally *on point* and meeting the moment,” it went on to say. It immediately establishes user trust.”
In the same post, he stated that if he sold the domain, he would make a significant payment to Sal Khan and Khan Academy.
“I’ve learned the value and importance of domain names over the years.” WordPlay.com (my word game) has 150 million games played and 16 million registered users. “I know for a fact that a lot of this is due to the domain being simple, memorable, and fun,” he added.
Days after purchasing the name, Shah spoke on a podcast and stated candidly, “The reason I bought it (chat.com) is I am trying to get into the AI parties.” Nobody knows who I am at that gathering!”
“I’ve done some things in some places, and that’s fine, but that particular group of people (AI industry) has no idea who I am,” Shah explained. He was also not concerned about losing the money. “Let’s say I lose a few million dollars; that’s worth the price of admission just to cover the cover charge,” he continued.
But, as it turns out, Shah did not lose. Shah stated in his recent LinkedIn post, “I am not launching anything major on it.” I’m not going to do anything about it. I’ve already sold the domain name. I sold it for more than I paid for it.”
“As promised, I have taken $250k of the gains and donated to Sal Khan and Khan Academy to support their efforts to use A.I. to create personalized education at scale for the rest of the world,” he wrote. “I have a strong belief in Sal, Khan Academy, and their mission.”
Shah, on the other hand, did not reveal the overall sale price or the buyer’s name. Khan Academy is a non-profit educational organization that offers free online materials and courses to help students study in a variety of areas. It was launched in 2008 by educator Salman Khan with the objective of making high-quality education available to anybody, everywhere.
