ARI signs up 21 new gTLD clients
ARI Registry Services says it signed up 21 new generic top-level domain clients in the first week after ICANN opened the program earlier this month.
The majority were dot-brand applicants, ARI said in a press release today. It has found that dot-brands represent about 60% of all the companies expressing interest in a new gTLD.
They all signed contracts between January 12, when ICANN starting taking applications, and January 19, the registry services provider said.
A spokesperson said that ARI expects to name some of its clients “in a matter of weeks”, but it’s not clear whether this will happen before March 29 – the deadline for making your first down-payment with ICANN – when it would be of most marketing use.
In the absence of this specific positive reinforcement of its message, the company today tried some FUD instead.
CEO Adrian Kinderis is quoted:
We have clients that are still undecided about whether they should apply. They have been put off by the negativity that has been surrounding the program. There have been delays and speculation. There is also a misguided perception amongst some that they can wait until the next round to secure their brand or generic category name. My message to those clients is that there is no certainty about when there will be another round. Potential applicants need to understand that if they take a ‘wait and see’ approach, they may miss out all together.
I’m not keen on this kind of fear-based marketing, but Kinderis has a point: the timing of the second-round is currently uncertain. Based on current evidence, I think an optimistic view is 2015.
I cover the subject in some depth on DomainIncite PRO (which you simply must subscribe to, otherwise your house will burn down with all of your cats inside… oh, look, I’m doing it now.)
Joint venture bids for Aussie city gTLDs
Cloud Registry, CoCCA and Sedari have teamed up to bid for the proposed Australian city top-level domains .melbourne and .sydney.
Sedari announced today that it has responded to the recently closed requests from proposals, which were opened by the state governments of New South Wales and Victoria a month ago.
The bid would see Cloud Registry operate the registry back-end itself, with Sedari handling back-office functions such as the ICANN contracts. CoCCA is on board for its country-code TLD experience.
While Sedari is UK-based, the venture has links to the continent.
CoCCA is based in New Zealand and has a NOC in Sydney, Cloud Registry is based in Sydney, and Sedari founder Liz Williams was once a board member of .au administrator auDA.
While no other firms have announced bids, you can expect that the usual suspects in the registry service provider market will have also applied.
I’d be surprised if local firm ARI Registry Services (formerly AusRegistry International), whose parent runs .au, is not a strong contender.
Aussies to apply for four geo-TLDs
The Australian state governments of New South Wales and Victoria have put out a tender for a registry provider for up to four new top-level domains.
They want to apply to ICANN next year for geographic gTLDs including .victoria, .sydney, .melbourne and possibly .nsw, according to the RFP.
The new gTLDs would be self-funded commercial ventures, with some names reserved for public use, it says. Revenue would be shared between the government and the operator.
If a local presence is taken into account then ARI Registry Services, which recently changed its name from AusRegistry International to dilute the perception that it was too Australia-focused, could be considered a likely front-runner for the gigs.
The tender closes November 15.
AusRegistry drops the “Aus”, sets up in US
AusRegistry International has rebranded itself as ARI Registry Services and will now offer new gTLD clients the option to host their domains in either Australia or the US.
The company has built itself a registry back-end in an undisclosed location on US soil to support the move.
Dropping the “Aus” appears to be specifically designed to address the perception that locating a gTLD in Australia is somehow technologically or politically risky, which ARI says isn’t the case.
ARI CEO Adrian Kinderis explained the decision in a press release:
We are the first to admit that the ‘Aus’ reference in our previous name incorrectly positioned us as a smaller, geographically focused organisation, which did create some issues with our plans for global expansion. Despite the fact we have an office and staff in the United States and clients situated in four of the seven continents around the world, there remained some belief that our services were somewhat isolated in Australia.
Potential gTLD applicants are concerned about issues such as “overzealous governments, privacy and ownership laws, political environments and financial benefits including currency fluctuations” that can vary according to the jurisdiction a registry is hosted in, ARI said.
A choice between the US and Australia may seem like a choice between one “overzealous government” and another, but it may at least put some insular American companies’ minds at rest.
While the move makes perfect business sense for ARI, I can’t help but feel that ICANN’s goal of increasing geographic diversity in the registry industry seems a little diminished this morning.
The rebranding does not affect the company’s parent, AusRegistry Group, which provides the back-end for Australia’s .au ccTLD.
ARI’s new domain is ariservices.com.
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