ICANN moves closer to launching a new gTLD round
At the ICANN76 Community Forum in Mexico, the ICANN Board adopted a series of recommendations made in the context of what within the ICANN community is known as the New gTLD Subsequent Procedures Policy Development Process. The approval of these recommendations (with some more requiring further discussions) marks ‘the start of the implementation process for the next round of new gTLDs’.
A little over 10 years after the New gTLD Program which saw the delegation of over 1,000 new generic top-level domains, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is now moving closer to launching a new gTLD round. At the ICANN76 Community Forum in Mexico, the ICANN Board adopted a series of recommendations made in the context of what within the ICANN community is known as the New gTLD Subsequent Procedures Policy Development Process. The approval of these recommendations (with some more requiring further discussions) marks ‘the start of the implementation process for the next round of new gTLDs’.
The Board also directed ICANN to deliver a comprehensive implementation plan, including a work plan, information for the infrastructure design, timelines, and anticipated resource requirements to achieve the necessary work to open the next round of gTLDs no later than 1 August 2023. The organisation can spend up to US$9 million to fund the implementation work through 31 October 2023.
Another Board decision was to direct ICANN to promote the New gTLD Program to prospective applicants, particularly those in underserved and underrepresented regions.