The landrush phase for the newly launched .africa domain name has entered
its 4th phase and final week from 26th June 2017, reports ITRealms.
Managing Director, Web4Africa,
Mr. Oluniyi Ajao, told ITRealms that
the Landrush Phase for .africa domain name system offers companies,
organizations and individuals to apply for domain names containing keywords
valuable enough to pay a premium for domain names with single words that
attract heavy every day use are very typical during this phase.
Dot Africa, he said, is the top-level domain name system for the
continent of Africa, which is open to all individuals and entities in Africa or
ones that identify with Africa, globally.
He also said, .Africa domains are available in Landrush Phase from
Web4Africa, an accredited .africa domain name registrar.
Ajao explained that this landrush phase is not exclusive to the
.africa top-level domain but normal with all newly-launched domain name
extensions. All things being equal, there is a much better chance that the
domain can be obtained during this Phase.
He reiterated that certain names have got prior rights associated
with them which would not go through unless the applicant has already
specifically validated rights in the Mark Validation System (MVS) or Trademark
Clearinghouse (TMCH) database.
“When processing a Landrush Application, Web4Africa will receive a
Claims Notice if the string is registered in the MVS or TMCH,” he said.
At the end of the landrush phase, he emphasized that all
uncontested domain applications will be delegated while all contested domain
applications will proceed to an Auction Phase. Applicants will be notified by
the .africa registry on the Auction process should this occur.
Domain auctions will last a minimum of 3 days. Any bids within the
final 12 hours will extend any auction by an additional 24 hours.
Dot Africa has already demonstrated serious interests from global
brands and entities within Africa who are trademark owners as about 1,000
domains were successfully secured during the Sunrise Phase, making it one of
the top 10 largest number of domain name reservations during the sunrise phase
of the new geographic Top Level Domain (gTLD) 's launch process.
According to him, the general availability phase would follow,
from 4th July 2017, stressing that the domains would then be available on a
first-come-first-served basis.
“We are in Africa, and Africa is in us. We believe in the future
of Africa and that .africa would offer Africans a strong identity on the World
Wide Web,” Mr. Ajao said.
ITRealms recalls that Web4Africa
was established in 2002, and is an accredited domain name registrar of the
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) offering popular
top-level domains like .com, .net, .xyz, .africa; and country-code domains like
.ng, .za, .uk to clients worldwide.
Web4Africa is based in Johannesburg, South Africa offering web hosting,
virtual private servers, dedicated servers and related solutions from four data
centres across Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa.
Nonye Dom/GEE
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