Annual report 2015: a new momentum for Afnic and the .fr TLD

Afnic’s main achievements and commitments in 2015

• Finalization of the opening of the registration of domain names consisting of one or two characters under the .fr TLD;
• Implementation of multi-year domain name registration under the .fr TLD for a period of one to ten years, and automatic renewal of registration.
• Launch of the “premium” Domain Names program for the .paris gTLD with an auctioning system specially developed for the city of Paris. As a result,at the end of 2015, nearly 200 domain names had been allocated.
• Creation of the “Opendata” portal for the .fr TLD, which aggregates and makes available to the public all the data related to domain name activity in the .fr namespace

With regard to the activities involving Afnic and .fr TLD

• The .fr TLD continued to grow in 2015, with an increase of 3.2% over the year, higher than the average performance of European ccTLDs (2.7%). Production costs for .fr domain names continued to decrease from € 3.60 in 2014 to € 3.50 in 2015.

• The reussir-en.fr campaign to promote the use of the .fr TLD by SOHOs / SMEs took over the French digital landscape, with over 100,000 visitors to the reussir-en.fr website, over 1,000 subscribers to the .fr box and 27 new partnerships to improve the visibility of the .fr TLD.The campaign was also awarded 1^st prize in the 2015 communication trophies.

• 2015 was the year in which the Afnic Foundation for Digital Solidarity was effectively established. By collecting the profits generated by Afnic business as registry for the .fr TLD, the Foundation is designed to support projects and initiatives using digital technology for the benefit of solidarity, social integration, economic development, to ensure that the Internet remains an opportunity for one and all.

• Thanks to the commitment of its CEO Mathieu Weill as co-Chair of the “accountability” working group, tasked with making proposals on the reform of ICANN as part of the transfer of the IANA function, Afnic continued its work in encouraging the French Internet community to address the issues related to global governance of the Internet.

• In 2015, Afnic continued to move forward on the issues such as the online presence of French people, digital solidarity and responsibility towards the community

• Finally, Afnic was rewarded for its excellence and security initiative when it was presented with its EFQM diploma “Recognized for Excellence” certification at 4 star-level by the general delegate of the European Foundation for Quality Management France.

Afnic key figures for 2015

• Download the 2015 activity report