In September 2014, the hosting company OVH launched an offer for new domain names under the .ovh gTLD. The new gTLD was designed for use by the IT community but also for the general public.
It is the first new gTLD in France to be opened to the general public in this way. OVH ultimately seeks to create a community of more than 700,000 users and partners.
From 2 October onwards, to celebrate the launch of the new domain names, OVH launched a promotional campaign for the registration of the first domain names under the .ovh gTLD. It was a great success with more than 50,000 .ovh domain names registered in 5 days.
That performance places OVH in the top 10 of the first registries for new gTLDs worldwide, in 6th place.
For Mathieu Weill, Afnic CEO, “Afnic’s mission is to support the French Internet community so that it plays a leading role at the global level. As the technical partner for the .ovh project, I am delighted that Afnic is backing the development of a French leader on the European market.”
About Afnic
Afnic is the acronym for Association Française pour le Nommage Internet en Coopération, the French Network Information Centre. The registry has been appointed by the French government to manage domain names under the .fr Top Level Domain. Afnic also manages the .re (Reunion Island), .pm (Saint-Pierre and Miquelon), .tf (French Southern and Antarctic Territories), .wf (Wallis and Futuna) and .yt (Mayotte) French Overseas TLDs.
In addition to managing French TLDs, Afnic’s role is part of a wider public interest mission, which is to contribute on a daily basis, thanks to the efforts of its teams and its members, to a secure and stable internet, open to innovation and in which the French internet community plays a leading role. As part of that mission, Afnic, a non-profit organization, has committed to devoting 11% of its Revenues from managing .fr Top Level Domain to actions of general interest, in particular by transferring €1.3 million each year to the Afnic Foundation for Digital Solidarity.
Afnic is also the back-end registry for the companies as well as local and regional authorities that have chosen to have their own TLD, such as .paris, .bzh, .alsace, .corsica, .mma, .ovh, .leclerc and .sncf.
Established in 1997 and based in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, Afnic currently has nearly 90 employees.
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