Tucows Announces World’s Largest Global Channel To Offer Multilingual Domain Name Registrations In 70 Languages

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February 22, 2001

New York, NY, Feb. 22, 2001 – Tucows Inc., the world’s leading provider of wholesale domain name registrations with a unique channel of resellers worldwide, announced today that it will begin offering multilingual domain name registrations in 70 languages, at $12 USD per domain, on February 26, 2001.

By offering all of these languages Tucows is providing its customers with almost three times the number of multilingual domain name registration opportunities than any other registrar, at a price point well below that of the competition.

“Through its network of more than 5,000 resellers, Tucows is poised to deliver multilingual domain names to millions of end user customers worldwide,” says Elliot Noss, CEO, Tucows. “With our superior technical solution, track record, and our established network of resellers living and doing business in every market in the world, Tucows is clearly in the best position to drive this business.”

In November 2000, Tucows helped pioneer the introduction of multilingual domain names to the Asian market. As a result of that initial launch, more than 800,000 domain name registrations have taken place in China, Japan and Korea. On February 9, 2001 VeriSign Global Registry Services announced the support of more than 70 new languages and their dialects to ICANN-accredited registrars. Some of these languages include: German, Italian, Danish, Dutch, Portuguese (including Brazilian Portuguese), Spanish (including South American Spanish), French (including Qu√©b√©cois), Turkish, Greek and Armenian.

Now, millions of non-English speaking registrants around the world will be able to register domain names in their own language, in their own alphabet, from their own standard computer keyboards. Registrants who operate primarily in English will now to able to extend their trademarks to other languages.

The Tucows OpenSRS (shared registration system) platform employs a wholesale model that was built on the premise that its resellers in more than 110 countries would have a much greater opportunity than the leading e-commerce providers to understand and serve the specific needs of their own local customers – quickly, easily and in their own language. Tucows believes this advantage should be particularly relevant in the drive to register multilingual domain names.

Tucows is also one of the few registrars to develop its own conversion solution (in accordance with the Internet Engineering Task Force) to perform multilingual registrations. Tucows believes this will offer its resellers several significant advantages over their competitors who will need to outsource their multilingual solutions.

Tucows’ resellers will be able to submit registration requests on behalf of their customers, at $12 USD per domain name, per year, using a simplified registration system that facilitates bulk orders. A single bulk order may include up to 50,000 domain names.

As these registrations are part of a test bed, VeriSign has advised all registrars that these names should be considered provisional. These names will not resolve within the current root system until VeriSign completes the resolution phase of this test bed. Resolution is the process by which a domain name is translated into an IP address, allowing Internet users to access web sites and send e-mail using the name. VeriSign Global Registry Services started resolution testing January 15, 2001 and it is expected to be completed by May 2001.

About Tucows

Tucows is a leading distributor of e-business services and applications on the Internet. With a network of more than 5,000 partners/resellers in more than 110 countries around the world, Tucows is the largest network of its kind. The Tucows site offers more than 30,000 software titles in libraries located around the world, providing users with a fast local download. Tucows Inc. is an ICANN-accredited registrar. Tucows is the world’s leading provider of wholesale domain name registrations and related services. For more information, please visit: http://www.opensrs.org or http://partner.tucows.com or go to https://www.tucows.com and click on Partner Home.