UK companies told to embrace .eu domains

February 2006

Relations between the EU and the UK have at times been strained but that should be no reason for UK companies to ignore the potential of registering a dot-eu domain name.

By the 7 April general release of dot-eu domains, pre-registrations for trademarked brands, as well as some predictably in-demand domains such as sex.eu, are expected to hit 1.5 million. However, UK names are conspicuous by their absence.

Registrar Nominet said UK applications for dot-eu domains account for less than one in 10. Nominet said it's likely UK companies are standing by the value of their dot-uk brands.

Damian Schmidt, CEO of rival domain name registrar Strato: "We think that in Great Britain the dot-eu domain just isn't a topic which is interesting people."

But he said that attitude could ultimately prove costly.