DotAsia to Launch Internationalized Domain Names (IDN) in 2010

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DotAsia to Launch Internationalized Domain Names (IDN) in 2010

Priority for Existing Alphanumeric .Asia Domain Registrants for Corresponding IDNs Considered

18 November 2009 - Hong Kong - DotAsia announces plan to release multilingual domain (IDN - Internationalized Domain Name) registrations in 2010. Following announcements by ICANN to approve the use of Internationalized Domain Names (IDN), DotAsia Organisation, the global top-level domain authority for ".Asia", will accept IDN registrations starting in the second half of 2010 to address the pent up demand in Asia for multilingual web addresses.

"Asia is one of the most important regions for IDN. Asia is already the largest Internet marketplace with over 700 million users online. However, that represents only 18.5% penetration. IDN will bring the Internet to the rest of the people in Asia who do not speak English," said Edmon Chung, CEO of DotAsia. "Small and Medium sized Enterprises around the world will benefit from IDN deployment. Local SMEs in Asia can leverage their existing brand in their native language to build their online presence with an IDN, while global SMEs can become more Asian-friendly by adopting an Asian IDN as their web address."

There are about 180 million domain names registered today, representing an estimated US$10 billion annual market, including secondary market and value added services. Much of this is currently concentrated in the US and Europe. With IDN, users and businesses in Asia will much better recognize the investment value of domain names because of the ability to represent offline identities and concepts online in their native languages. The deployment of IDN has the potential to dramatically expand the domain market in Asia.

DotAsia will release draft IDN launch policies in December 2009 and invite industry experts and users to provide input in an open process. Policies will be finalized in March 2010 after the APRICOT conference in Kuala Lumpur. Policies to be developed include Sunrise and Landrush provisions to balance intellectual property rights holders concerns and public interests. Offering existing registrants priority to register their corresponding IDN domain, especially for Romanized or transliterated names such as Pinyin domains will also be considered. Further info at: http://www.idn.asia

DotAsia is the first generic top-level-domain (gTLD) to include IDN TLD in its application to ICANN. IDN is a priority for DotAsia, and the organization continues to contribute its expertise to global IDN development. "Being an inventor of IDN technology, and having served on many technology and policy committees, it is very exciting to see IDN become a reality after over 10 years of hardwork by the community," added Edmon Chung. "DotAsia and its members are pioneers of IDN, and will be among the first to offer full IDN experiences to users in Asia."

http://www.idn.asia/main