Thread: CircleID article on Indian Domains

A great article by Arjun Nair of CircleID about Indian Domains. He's predicting that the total number of domains registered by people in India (including .in, .com, etc.) will increase from the current 1.9 million to around 17 million in 2015:

India - The Internet's Next Billion

There are close to 100 million internet users in the country today, which is a drastic overhaul compared to the mere 5 million back in 2000. It accounts for 6.8% internet penetration in the country, compared to the saturated US market (71% internet Penetration). It gets even more interesting when we take a look at the growth that this Indian market is set to experience. India's internet population is expected to reach a staggering 237 Million by 2015 at a CAGR of 20%, resulting in 19% internet penetration.

Some interesting predictions for the Indian market. The growth is encouraging although I think its quite optimistic.
The question will be, what percentage of the growth will be in .in/.co.in versus .com.
In my recent trip to India, I did notice a much larger number of ads with .in/co.in in there, compared to a year ago. There is more usage of wireless 3g modem/laptops.

That would mean ~8 million .in domains by that time if the .in ratio in total number of all domains regged in India stay the same as now (1 mil : 1,9 mil).

Sounds too good to be true but you never know.

Originally Posted by Jeff

A great article by Arjun Nair of CircleID about Indian Domains. He's predicting that the total number of domains registered by people in India (including .in, .com, etc.) will increase from the current 1.9 million to around 17 million in 2015:

India - The Internet's Next Billion

The author is an employee of LogixBoxes whose parent company is Directi.

I'll take his predictions with lots of grain of salt.

I agree with you Ace.

Even if internet penetration increases 10 to 20 times, the good domains are all registered.


The internet registration by Indians will increase to some extend due to:
a) Indians buying .in and .com in the secondary market
b) Introduction of country code IDN 's


It's hard to justify the growth from 1.9 million to around 17 million in 2015.

According to us these figures are inflated, this is because estimates are done seeing the growth of mobile market but there is basic difference between mobile user and internet user and you cannot treat them at par.

Mobile user increased many folds because of landline phone have long waiting period in cities and this also cheaper option for communication and same is necessity.

But if you count Internet of course users are increasing but if you see age factor then young one are the main segment which is using the internet. Using internet required basic computer knowledge and still majority of Indians donot have computers and basic education to handle the computers.

But we hope that inspite of that Indian market is having great potential compare to other economies.

This article was originally published on the domaintools blog a while back, if you visit you'll see I'd commented on it then. What's completely accurate is Arjun's coinage / usage of DPR (domain penetration ratio), if anyone has any other numbers I'd be extremely interested in taking a look at them.

I've been developing for the Indian market since 1998 and I'd like to say he's quite accurate in his prediction about number of users, though Mitsu is right in saying that a lot of the increase is in the mobile sector.

And even if you assume he's wrong about the number of domains... the number of people going online in India is a matter of public record. What happens if the number of domains don't increase? The prices in the resale market go through the roof. Fail to see how that's a bad thing for most of us here.