The Austrian registry nic.at is making forays into Germany signing agreements to provide registry services first with the operators of the proposed .HAMBURG gTLD and this week announcing they will also provide the same for .BERLIN.
The decision of dotBERLIN to select nic.at to supply registry services is quite an achievement given dotBERLIN is one of the earliest and most experienced of the likely applicants for a new gTLD.
It is also to be expected there will be a flurry of announcements and deals being made with ICANNâs announcement Monday to approve the generic Top Level Domain programme and begin taking a first round of applications in January 2012 with the intention that those approved will be operational in early 2013 according to a new revised timetable released by ICANN when they approved the new gTLD programme.
âWe are proud to have won over dotBERLIN GmbH & Co. KG â our highest-profile city TLD initiative so far â and canât wait to start contributing our expertise to this international flagship project,â said Richard Wein, CEO of nic.at.
In selecting nic.at, dotBERLIN considered several potential providers of registry services, evaluating suitability according to technical, organisational and financial criteria as well as the requirements laid out in the ICANN Applicants Guidebook.
âNic.at is trusted and held in extremely high regard throughout the industry,â said Dirk Krischenowski, CEO of dotBERLIN.
âThe Austrian registry has extensive experience in the secure and glitch-free operation of more than one million .AT domains. We are certain the nic.at is the right partner to support the .BERLINâs ICANN application procedure.â