Domain name .eu in world top 10 a year after launch

BRUSSELS: A year after its launch, 2.5 million Europeans and companies have registered a .eu domain name, making it the seventh most widespread website address suffix in the world and the third in the European Union.

Air France, Italian design house Versace and Belgian-French financial services group Dexia are among the firms that have registered and have functioning websites, the European Commission said on Wednesday.   

"After just one year, .eu has become a well-established part of Europe's cyberspace," EU Information Society Commissioner Viviane Reding said in a statement.

"This is a positive sign of the attractiveness of electronic commerce within the EU."   

Just under 80 per cent of registered names are used, rather than bought only to reserve a name, the EU's executive arm said.   

In the 27-member bloc, Britain's .uk and Germany's .de are more popular than the .eu domain, which is surpassed worldwide by .com, .net, .org and .info, according to the Commission.   

The registration process is managed by an independent not-for-profit organisation called EURid, which says domain names can cost at least 5-45 euros depending on whether they are for a private entity, public body, or trademarked name.    

The Commission said last April it expected EURid to register almost a quarter of a million firms and organisations by the end of 2006.