.asia domain name open for business

Stuart Corner
Sunday, 14 October 2007 15:36

Your IT - Home IT

It has been seven years in the making but finally, the new .asia domain name has opened for registrations.

There could be strong competition for names: from unrelated companies that share brands, business names or trademarks but which operate in different industries.

Jonathan Robinson, CEO of NetNames, a company which which manages the domain name portfolios for major global brands, said: "After years of talks and negotiations .asia is finally here and all the signs are that it will be in even higher demand than .eu. Companies with registered trademarks can apply at this stage, but need to beware of other organisations trading with the same brand names in different countries or industries that will have just as much of a claim to the same .asia domain names. Businesses need to ensure they get their valid applications in during the sunrise period to avoid missing out."

Sunrise applications for the new .asia domain name will be split over two periods. The first began on 9 October 2007 when companies were invited to secure their registered trademarks. The second begins on 13 November 2007 when companies which have already secured their registered trademarks will be invited to secure additional domain names related specifically to their line of business (eg Nokia will also be able to register nokiatelecommunications.asia). At this time registered companies with an official, legal presence in Asia will also be able to secure their business or other legally recognised trading names.
The .asia domain name will then open to the general public in February 2008 when the most popular domain names will be auctioned off to the highest bidders. The first .asia domain names will go live in March 2008.

The DotAsia Organisation (http://www.dotasia.org ), a membership-based not-for-profit corporation located in Hong Kong, was created in March of 2004 for the purpose of submitting a proposal to ICANN to operate a new TLD registry for the .asia top-level domain (TLD).  It has appointed over 100 registries around the world that can accept applications for .asia names.