.AE United Arab Emirates: ccTLD Spotlight
A look at the .AE country code domain name.
Overview: United Arab Emirates (UAE) is a federation of seven states in the middle east, counting Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Dubai, Fujairah, Ras al-Khaimah, Sharjah, and Umm al-Quwain. This oil-rich territory uses the country code domain name .AE.
Population and Demographics: UAE has only five million residents, but that number is growing quickly as the area quickly booms with its oil and development wealth. If you’ve seen pictures of that man-made island in the shape of a palm tree, that’s the UAE. The official language is Arabic, but many of the emirates have sizable English speaking populations along with expatriate populations.
Domain registration:Anyone can register a .AE domain name, but it’s not as simple as going to GoDaddy and
registering it. None of the major registrars appear to offer it, perhaps since of the manual process used by UAEnic to register domains.
UAE Flag
You can easily search for available domain names at nic.ae, but registering is a different matter. You must complete a paper form and fax it in along with a copy of your photo ID and payment authorization. Renewal also requires sending in paper forms, but the registry offers 50 year registrations. A one year registration costs 150 AED, approximately $41 USD. The Nic.ae site promises an online registration process coming soon, but that message has been on its web site for over a year.
Registering online is an option if you’re willing to pay an intermediary or psuedo-registrar. AsiaRegistry.com, for example, will register .ae domain names for $199 a year.
Poker.ae is available, but don’t bother registering it. You cannot register domains related to gambling, sex, and religion with a .ae extension.
Aftermarket: DNSalePrice.com doesn’t show any aftermarket sales. Searching a few forums, it appears that a couple people have sold two letter and generic .ae domain names for $1,000-$10,000. A number of quality domain names are still available, and the area is a booming, so there may be upside potential. Arabic character domains may also present an opportunity.
