ICANN granted stay of execution over IANA contract

ICANN has been granted a six-month extension to run the IANA contract but in an extraordinary statement put out by the NTIA this morning has been told its proposal to run the contract long-term was sub-standard.

The decision to cancel the IANA rebid process, announced this morning, caught many by surprise, particularly since an announcement of the process' winner was due any day. In a subsequent clarifying statement, the NTIA explained that "we received no proposals that met the requirements requested by the global community".

As a result of having received no bids that met its RFP criteria, the US government has cancelled the RFP process, extended the current contract (for a second time) to 30 September 2012, and noted that it "intends to reissue the RFP at a future date to be determined (TBD) so that the requirements of the global internet community can be served".

What does it mean?