.中信 New gTLD Application
Click to view Chinese translation articles.
-----------------------------------
New gTLD Application Submitted to ICANN by: CITIC Group Corporation
String: 中信
Originally Posted: 13 June 2012
Application ID: 1-914-3594
Applicant Information
- Full legal name
CITIC Group Corporation
- Address of the principal place of business
Capital Mansion, 6 Xinyuannanlu, Chaoyang District
Beijing 100004
CN
- Phone number
+861059668717
- Fax number
+861084865860
- If applicable, website or URL
http:⁄⁄www.citic.com
Primary Contact
6(a). Name
Mr. Jing Zhao
6(b). Title
Information Analyst
6(c). Address
6(d). Phone Number
+861059661031
6(e). Fax Number
6(f). Email Address
Secondary Contact
7(a). Name
Yanling Lu
7(b). Title
Senior Information Analyst
7(c). Address
7(d). Phone Number
+861059661032
7(e). Fax Number
7(f). Email Address
Proof of Legal Establishment
8(a). Legal form of the Applicant
corporation
8(b). State the specific national or other jursidiction that defines the type of entity identified in 8(a).
- R. China
8(c). Attach evidence of the applicant's establishment.
Attachments are not displayed on this form.
9(a). If applying company is publicly traded, provide the exchange and symbol.
9(b). If the applying entity is a subsidiary, provide the parent company.
9(c). If the applying entity is a joint venture, list all joint venture partners.
Applicant Background
11(a). Name(s) and position(s) of all directors
Chang Zhenming Chairman
Dou Jianzhong Executive Director
Gao Jianhong Equity Director
Liu Zhiqiang Worker’s Director
Qu Yonglan Equity Director
Tian Guoli Vice-Chairman
Wang Jiong Executive Director
Yang Jinming Equity Director
Yu Zhensheng Equity Director
11(b). Name(s) and position(s) of all officers and partners
Chang Zhenming Chairman
Dou Hongquan Supervisor
Dou Jianzhong Executive Director
Gao Jianhong Equity Director
Li Zengyuan Supervisor
Lin Meifang Supervisor
Liu Zhiqiang Worker’s Director
Qu Yonglan Equity Director
Tian Guoli President
Tian Guoli Vice-Chairman
Wang Jiong Executive Director
Yang Jinming Equity Director
Yu Zhensheng Equity Director
Zhang Xiaoping Worker’s Supervisor
Zheng Yongqin Worker’s Supervisor
11(c). Name(s) and position(s) of all shareholders holding at least 15% of shares
Ministry of Finance of the Peopleʹs Republic of China Not Applicable
11(d). For an applying entity that does not have directors, officers, partners, or shareholders: Name(s) and position(s) of all individuals having legal or executive responsibility
Applied-for gTLD string
- Provide the applied-for gTLD string. If an IDN, provide the U-label.
中信
14(a). If an IDN, provide the A-label (beginning with "xn--").
xn--fiQ64B
14(b). If an IDN, provide the meaning or restatement of the string in English, that is, a description of the literal meaning of the string in the opinion of the applicant.
CITIC (China International Trust and Investment Corporation)
14(c). If an IDN, provide the language of the label (in English).
Chinese
14(c). If an IDN, provide the language of the label (as referenced by ISO-639-1).
ZH-CN
14(d). If an IDN, provide the script of the label (in English).
Han Simplified Script
14(d). If an IDN, provide the script of the label (as referenced by ISO 15924).
Hans
14(e). If an IDN, list all code points contained in the U-label according to Unicode form.
U+4E2D U+4FE1
15(a). If an IDN, Attach IDN Tables for the proposed registry.
Attachments are not displayed on this form.
15(b). Describe the process used for development of the IDN tables submitted, including consultations and sources used.
The IDN table adopted by the Applicant is formulated according to the process specified by Chinese Domain Names Consortium (CDNC), which is developed according to the guiding principles described in RFC 3743 and RFC 4713.
The IDN table formulation process, a described in RFC 3743, is “an effort of the Joint Engineering Team (JET), a group composed of members of CNNIC, TWNIC, KRNIC, and JPNIC as well as other individual experts. It offers guidelines for zone administrators, including but not limited to registry operators and registrars and information for all domain names holders on the administration of domain names that contain characters drawn from Chinese, Japanese, and Korean scripts.” Details of the development process of the IDN table, please refer to RFC 3743 at: http:⁄⁄www.ietf.org⁄rfc⁄rfc3743.txt.
15(c). List any variant strings to the applied-for gTLD string according to the relevant IDN tables.
“.中信” in Unicode is U+4E2D U+4FE1
According to the IDN table submitted and using RFC 3743 algorithm as the basis, the followings are the IDN Variants for “.中信”
1) U+4E2D U+4F29
- Describe the applicant's efforts to ensure that there are no known operational or rendering problems concerning the applied-for gTLD string. If such issues are known, describe steps that will be taken to mitigate these issues in software and other applications.
16.1 Internet Browser versions
Issue: the older versions of the Internet browsers do not support Chinese domain names, such as Opera (version below 9.2), Firefox (Version below 2.0), Internet Explorer (Version below 7), Safari (version below 3.1 ) and Netscape (version below 8.0).
Applicant’s effort: The Applicant would join with other Chinese gTLDs and Browser vendors to encourage the adoption of latest Internet browsers among Chinese Internet users so that to have a smooth browsing experience on IDNs.
16.2 The TLD white list issue
Issue: the TLD white list of Firefox currently does not include the applied-for string.
Applicant’s effort: Once the TLD is approved and delegated, the Applicant will notify Firefox of this matter. Firefox shall insert the string into the TLD white list of the Firefox to enable the support of the string. The procedure to do so is described in http:⁄⁄www.mozilla.org⁄projects⁄security⁄tld-idn-policy-list.html.
16.3 Registration Data Directory Services (RDDS)
Issue: RFC 3912 only suggest ASCII encoding in Whois protocol, which is inadequate to support Chinese domain names in the RDDS.
Applicant’s effort: The entrusted Back-End Service Provider have adopted UTF-8 encoding format to support the query and display both in English and Chinese. The Applicant is fully aware that the ICANN is developing the policy Internationalized Registration Data along with the technical standardization work at IETF. The Applicant would work with the Back-End Service Provider to adopt the latest development at ICANN and IETF in this regard.
16.4 Variant Chinese domain names registration issues
Issue: The EPP Protocol does not support bundled registration for simplified, traditional Chinese characters and its variants to the same registrant.
Applicant’s effort: in line with RFC 3743 and RFC 4713, the Applicant and the Back-end Service Provider agreed on the registration policy as such: when registering the Chinese domain names, the registrant will be given a pure simplified Chinese form, a pure traditional Chinese form along with its original form in a bundle. Other variant form of the Chinese domain name will be reserved for the registrant. The Applicant and the Back-end Service Provider as such have adapted the Extensible Provisioning protocol (EPP) in accordance with RFC 3735 to realize the above mentioned registration policy.
- (OPTIONAL) Provide a representation of the label according to the International Phonetic Alphabet (http://www.langsci.ucl.ac.uk/ipa/).
[tʂuŋ] [ɕin]
Mission/Purpose
18(a). Describe the mission/purpose of your proposed gTLD.
18 (a) Describe the mission⁄purpose of your proposed gTLD.
Approved by the State Council, CITIC Group has transformed into a wholly state-owned company through comprehensive restructuring and changed its name to CITIC Group Corporation (“CITIC Group”), with RMB 183.70263 billion as the registered capital and Mr. Chang Zhenming as the legal representative.
CITIC Group was established in 1979 by Comrade Rong Yiren with the initiation and support by Comrade Deng Xiaoping. Since its inception, CITIC Group Corporation has given full play to the role of a pilot of national economic reform and an important window on China’s opening to the outside world and made explorations and innovation in many business fields with remarkable success. It has blazed a new trail of development for China’s “Reform and Opening-up” as well as the “Modernization Drive” by attracting and utilizing foreign capital, introducing advanced technologies, and adopting advanced and scientific international practice in operation and management thus building up good reputation and image both home and abroad with a remarkable performance.
Up to now, CITIC Group has developed into a large state-owned multinational conglomerate with a balanced development of both financial and non-financial businesses. Its financial business covers a full range of services including commercial banking, investment banking, trust, insurance, fund management and asset management and its non-financial business includes real estate, engineering contracting, energy and resources, infrastructure construction, machinery manufacturing and IT industry with clear overall strength and great momentum of development.
At the end of 2010, CITIC Group’s total assets stood at RMB 2539.1 billion, net assets RMB 172.5 billion, operating income RMB 263.9 billion and net profit RMB 33.4 billion. CITIC Group was enlisted in the Fortune Global 500 for the third consecutive year in 2011, ranking the 221st.
On the financial services side, CITIC Group drove business collaboration among its financial affiliates and upgraded its shared information platform. Fully capitalizing on this synergy, the affiliates registered new progress in co-underwriting, cross product design and client information sharing, and the Group further secured its position as an integrated financial service provider. As of the end of 2010, total assets of CITIC Group’s financial services stood at RMB 2.0958 trillion (US$329 Billion), an increase of 16% year on year (yoy), and total profit RMB 34.5 billion (US$5.43 Billion).
With regards to the non-financial business side, total assets of CITIC Group’s non-financial business stood at RMB 410.2 billion (US$64.6 Billion), an increase of 23.9% yoy, operating income in 2010 RMB 191.7 billion (US$30.19 Billion), up 38.8% yoy, and total profit RMB 19.2 billion (US$3.02 Billion), up 62.1% yoy.
Globally, the headcount for CITIC Group, as of the end of 2010, stood at 140,028. Moving forward, CITIC Group will carry out the development agenda for the next five-year period, embracing a client-centered business philosophy, and promoting overarching restructuring. New models of management and control will be explored, and key investments and projects conducted. More efforts shall be made in business and investment management as well as risk control. Tapping into its comprehensive advantage and synergy, the Group is expected to breakthrough in scientific development, and will continue to strive to be a world-renowned conglomerate that enjoys prominent overall strength, excellence in various sectors and market competitiveness.
CITIC Group is applying for “.中信” Top Level Domain (“applied-for TLD”) which is the commonly known shortened English name for CITIC Group.
The vision for the applied for gTLD “.中信” is to become the online brand for this Global Fortune 500 conglomerate. Through this gTLD, CITIC Group will be able to protect its brand and deliver the right impression and message to the end users, thus becoming the brand protection and brand building mechanism that the conglomerate deserves to have in this modern age of the internet. Furthermore, “.中信” will have a multiplier effect on CITIC Group’s efforts to expand and promote its range of businesses globally.
Currently, CITIC Group has over 30 million clients worldwide, which would drive traffic and recognition of the “.中信” domain when it is launched globally. This would also help accelerate the acceptance of “.中信” domain, and create a new market for these users that would like to have their own “.中信” domain name if and when CITIC Group decides to open it up to them. By offering customized “.中信” personal domain names and services like homepages, email accounts and applications, its multitude of clients, internal employees and business partners, CITIC Group can increase and improve these relevant parties’ trust and relationship with itself. This creates a virtuous cycle whereby CITIC Group can observe that its brand equity will increase through the usage of “.中信” domain names. By the third year, CITIC Group expects “.中信” to have about 9800 domain names at a wholesale price of RMB 400 (US$63.56) per domain per year.
By consolidating all the domain names associated with CITIC Group and its subsidiaries, “.中信” will unify all of the conglomerate’s online related businesses, reposition them and create a solid foundation for the future. By doing so, CITIC Group can further increase the scope and range of its online related businesses while consolidating its position in the market. To fulfill this purpose and mission, CITIC Group will invest heavily on upgrading and improving the security and intelligence of its information technology backbone and architecture.
For the first time since the invention of the Internet, a company will have full ownership of a top level domain “brand” name. It is with this in mind that “.中信” term is first conceived. More importantly, with such leverage, CITIC Group, through “.中信”, can help to promote healthy competition from the registrars by dictating the level of service and quality expected that is consistent with the stature of such a Global Fortune 500 company.
Furthermore, this will increase the level of trust from the users as problems like phishing, domain redirection and domain parking will be eliminated. Users know that they can depend on such gTLDs that are the brand personification of the actual entity. At the same time, it is so much easier for users to remember instantly and search for such famous companies. The introduction of “.中信” in its IDN form will also greatly benefit the local users (500 million internet users alone in China) by providing better user experience and more choices for access.
Through the presence and increased access and usage of “.中信”, the online persona and brand of CITIC Group, “.中信” gTLD will benefit ICANN in successfully showcasing how a Global Fortune 500 company can effectively manage, protect and expand its online presence using a gTLD.
18(b). How do you expect that your proposed gTLD will benefit registrants, Internet users, and others?
18 (b) How do you expect that your proposed gTLD will benefit registrants, Internet users, and others? What is the goal of your proposed TLD in terms of areas of specialty, service levels, or reputation?
As mentioned in Question 18(a), “.中信” is directly associated with CITIC Group. “.中信” is intended to be the online brand of CITIC Group, and is tasked with the responsibility of building and promoting the online brand. The registrants, internet users and others will understand that any domain under “.中信” is managed and supervised by CITIC Group.
Hence, internet users will be able to fully trust “.中信” domain names since they will know that they are being served by the CITIC Group. At the same time, CITIC Group strives to provide high level service to its registrants and users exceeding the Registry Performance Specifications (Specification 10 of the gTLD Registry Agreement) for “.中信”. Please refer to the answer on Question 23 for the details on the service level provided by CITIC Group.
Secure and trusted services shall come to be associated with “.中信” domain names as “.中信” is the official online brand of the global fortune 500 company, CITIC Group.
What do you anticipate your proposed TLD will add to the current space, in terms of competition, differentiation, or innovation?
Currently, CITIC Group has found it difficult to manage its domain name portfolio and maintain a consistent and secure brand image which unfortunately is currently scattered across several different TLDs. With the introduction and utilization of “.中信”, CITIC Group will be able to provide a consistent brand image and innovate on services for its customers, internet users and corporate internal users.
Firstly, CITIC Group shall make “.中信” a secure space dedicated for CITIC Group and its customers and partners.
In addition to that, through “.中信”, CITIC Group envisions providing innovative service to its customers based on its own offline products and services in close collaboration with different sectors and branches of CITIC Group.
For example, “.中信” may serve as a focal point for the online communications, internal communication and information sharing within the entire CITIC Group,. Cross sector or cross border collaboration or online training could rely on the “.中信” domain space to be carried out in a secure and stable manner.
Of course, the addition of “.中信” in the root will contribute to the competition on the domain name industry, offering more choices and services to CITIC Group and its customers, and better yet, offering a competitive environment for other TLDs to enhance their security and stability of their respective zones. This indirectly encourages the existing gTLDs to provide more innovative or better services at a lower price.
What goals your proposed gTLD have in terms of user experience?
CITIC Group believes that “.中信” as a gTLD will achieve the following goals in terms of user experience:
Trust:
“.中信” will inspire trust and confidence in the consumers as they know that they are dealing with CITIC Group or⁄and its subsidiaries when they interact with “.中信” domain names.
Secure:
The registrants of the “.中信” domain names can be confident that the registered domain names are managed and controlled by the CITIC Group with the highest security and availability. Cybersquatting, email fraud, phishing, spoof and other domain name abuses will not occur or will be greatly reduced when using “.中信” TLD.
Brand:
To the internet users, “.中信” domain names bear the brand of CITIC Group and can be naturally affiliated with its products or services or employees of CITIC Group. Internet users hence will inherently trust the website that is offering CITIC products or services.
All in all, registrants, internet users and the general public shall regard “.中信” as the official online presence of CITIC Group, and the service on this space is an official offering by the CITIC Group. This TLD is trusted and secure managed by CITIC Group.
Provide a complete description of the applicant’s intended registration policies in support of the goals listed above.
String Policy
Domain names can contain the English-language letters A through Z, the digits 0 through 9 and hyphens (LDH -- Letters, Digits, Hyphens).
a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 -
Hyphens however cannot be used for the first or last character of the second level domain name. Spaces and special characters (such as !, $, &, e, and so on) are not currently acceptable. The maximum number of LDH characters accepted for a second level domain is 63.
WHOIS Policy
CITIC Group shall operate as a ʺthickʺ registry, in which all of the information associated with registered entities, including both technical information and social information is stored within a central registry repository.
CITIC Group shall deploy ante-audit mechanism. The domain name will not be registered unless all registration materials as well as the real ID and contact information of the registrants or their purveyors to be verified by the Audit team of the accredited registrars.
CITIC Group also commits itself to maintain timely, unrestricted and public access to accurate and complete WHOIS information, including registrant, technical, billing, and administrative contact information. Details of the WHOIS policy can be found in answer to Question 26.
Others
- UDRP and URS as described in the answer to Question 29
- Sunrise process as describe in the answer to Question 29
- Geographic name restriction as described in answer to Question 22
- Trademark protection as describe in answer to Question 29
- Domain Name Lifecycle as describe in answer to Question 27
- Data Privacy as describe in Question 18(c) below
- Reserved list as describe in the answer to Question 29
Will your proposed TLD impose any measures for protecting the privacy or confidential information of registrants or users? If so, please describe any such measures.
CITIC Group would adopt stringent policies to protect the privacy of registrants and its domain name users as per the ICANN WHOIS policy and China data protection regulation.
As such policy and regulation may be modified in the future, CITIC Group will also amend its privacy policy accordingly from time to time.
Specifically, CITIC Group is subjected to China’s Information Security Technology -- Guide of Personal Information Protection. In brief, the CITIC Group shall inform the registrants
- i) The purpose of any personal information collected and scope of use
- ii) The period in which these personal information will be stored
iii) The security measure and information protection policy to safeguard the personal information
- iv) The rights of the registrants on the personal information
- v) The registrant responsibility for accuracy of the personal information
In general, no personal information will be collected without the consent of the registrants and the registrants shall have the Rights to Confidential, Rights to Knowledge, and Rights to Opt Out⁄Change Data⁄Prohibit Use.
Specifically, the Registration Agreement contains the clause which clearly states how the personal information will be collected and used and how the WHOIS information will be displayed. Any information other than the WHOIS shall not be collected and used.
The information submitted by the registrants shall be regarded as classified information and shall be processed by specially designated personnel. Without the written consent of registrants, the information collected cannot be used in the way other than WHOIS purpose.
The back-end registry service provider shall deploy security measures to protect the integrity of the database against potential stealth or unintended leakage. Please refer to answer to Question 30 for more information in this regard.
Describe whether and in what ways outreach and communication will help to achieve your projected benefits.
CITIC Group envisions the “.中信” TLD to be an integral part of its overall brand resource. The projected benefits such as consumer trust, recognition of “.中信” online and competition will be achieved through a series of promotion and marketing activities.
At the application stage, outreaches will be given to the subset of CITIC Group to raise the awareness of the online presence of “.中信” within the entire group. It will give the various sectors of the group a precious opportunity to promote their products and services or even more innovative application of the “.中信” through this dedicated cyberspace. Internal trainings shall be held in various sectors and branches to achieve the outreach purpose.
After that, outreach and promotion will go to the customers of CITIC Group. As the targeted users of the “.中信” domain names, the customers shall benefit enormously through the secure and trusted online experience on the “.中信” domain. Brochure and flyer illustrating the “.中信” domain names and its services will be presented at each and every CITIC Group outlet.
After the delegation of the applied-for string, offline and online advertisement will be used to attract their attention. Branding campaigns will also be conducted to promote the “.中信” TLD to convey the impression that “.中信” is the online presence of CITIC Group and any online services provided by using the “.中信” domain names” is reliable and trustworthy.
18(c). What operating rules will you adopt to eliminate or minimize social costs?
18 (c) What operating rules will you adopt to eliminate or minimize social costs (e.g., time or financial resource costs, as well as various types of consumer vulnerabilities)? What other steps will you take to minimize negative consequences⁄costs imposed upon consumers?
The application and use of “.中信” TLD is meant to improve consumer trust and to minimize consumer costs. CITIC Group has developed and adopted several operating rules to this end.
CITIC Group will also adopt rights protection mechanisms to protect trademarks and geographic names. More information in this regard can be seen in the answer to Question 29.
CITIC Group will also adopt anti-abuse policy as described in the answer to Question 28 to prevent and mitigate any potential domain name abuse.
Answers should address the following points:
How will multiple applications for a particular domain name be resolved, for example, by auction or on a first-come⁄first-serve basis?
Specifically, with regards to multiple applications for a particular name, they would be addressed in the following manner, depending on who the applicants are:
- i) During the pre-launch period, CITIC Group will implement a Sunrise service for trademark holders with supporting letter from the CITIC Group’s legal department. If there are multiple eligible applications, CITIC Group will resolve this using the internal dispute resolution mechanism (please refer to answer to Question 29 for details):
CITIC Group will setup a panel to facilitate the negotiations. This panel shall conduct internal negotiation by hearing both parties on the rights claims. The Panel then would come to a conclusion regarding the rights of the domain name registrant within 5 working days
- ii) During open registration period, CITIC Group will abide by the first-come-first -served policy to registration applications.
Explain any cost benefits for registrants you need to implement (e.g. advantageous pricing, introductory discounts, bulk registration discounts).
The running of “.中信” is based on a cost-recovery basis. As such, there is no intention to provide any promotion or bulk registration discount.
Note that the Registry Agreement requires that registrars be offered the option to obtain initial domain name registrations for periods of one to ten years at the discretion of the registrar, but no greater than ten years. Additionally, the Registry Agreement requires advance written notice of price increases. Do you intend to make contractual commitments to registrants regarding the magnitude of price escalation? If so, please describe your plans.
As “.中信” TLD is not geared toward for profit, the magnitude of price increase per year will not be higher than 10% to offset the increase of operation cost. CITIC Group shall inform of the price adjustment to its registrars at least 6 month in advance.
CITIC Group will offer optional multi year registrations for up to ten years. Any registrants who make advance payment for multi year registrations will not be affected by any price adjustment during the period they had made advance payment for.