Neustar : CO hits 2 million domains as premium sales surge

Jan 11, 2016

Five years from global launch and .CO is still growing strong

STERLING, VA, - Neustar, Inc. (NYSE:NSR), the operator of the .CO Top-Level Domain, today announced that .CO has surpassed 2 million total domain names under management, with new domain registration growth accelerating from 10 percent in 2014 to 18 percent in 2015.

'Since its global launch five years ago, .CO continues to grow and has become the domain name of choice for innovators, entrepreneurs and businesses in more than 200 countries around the world,' said Sean Kaine, Vice President of Registry at Neustar.

He noted that global brands like Twitter (t.co and Vine.co), Google (g.co and campus.co) and Taco Bell (ta.co) have all helped to bring mainstream awareness and adoption to .CO.

This is in addition to the hundreds of thousands of innovators, entrepreneurs and startups that every year choose .CO as the domain for their business, including high profile organizations like 500 Startups (500.co), Angel List (Angel.co), Up Global (Up.co) and Common Bond (CommonBond.co) to name just a few.

While Neustar's portfolio of .CO premium domain names has consistently enjoyed high demand from big brands and funded Silicon Valley startups, the last quarter has also seen a sharp rise in demand from Chinese investors. Interest from China has been particularly strong in connection with two character number-number and letter-letter premium domain names.

Facts about the 2 million .CO domain names

• In 2010, .CO had 28,000 domain name registrations. Surpassing 2 million registrations represents a greater than 7,000% increase in growth since the global launch of the namespace.
  
• The .CO renewal rate continues to show high usage of domains in a similar fashion to the industry standard, at around 50% for first year renewals and increasing to 80% for domains registered for more than five years (i.e. domains that have been renewed more than five times since 2010).
  
• .CO is a global namespace, with 50% of registrations coming from the US, 11% from the UK, 5% from Colombia, 4% from Canada and 3% from India.

With over 3 billion Internet users around the world, and increasing demand for short, memorable, domain names, Mr. Kaine said he expects demand for .CO to continue among startups, innovators and entrepreneurs - especially in growing economies like India and China.

'Even in the face of hundreds of new Top-Level Domains entering the market, today's milestone is a testament to the fact that startups, innovators and entrepreneurs from around the globe continue to adopt .CO web addresses at a rapid pace,' Mr. Kaine said.

'.CO is where big ideas belong on the web and our data demonstrates that this will continue to be the case.'

About Neustar, Inc.
Neustar, Inc. (NYSE: NSR) is the first real-time provider of cloud-based information services, enabling marketing and IT security professionals to promote and protect their businesses. With a commitment to privacy and neutrality, Neustar operates complex data registries and uses its expertise to deliver actionable, data-driven insights that help clients make high-value business decisions in real time, one customer interaction at a time. More information is available at www.neustar.biz.