Google Inc announced yesterday it had made a deal with China
Mobile Ltd to enter the nation's emerging mobile search market.
Under the agreement, Google will integrate its search engine
into China Mobile's "monternet" mobile platform providing a package
of services including news, ringtones, wallpaper, videos and
games.
"Our cooperation with China Mobile will help achieve Google's
mission of making information available anytime, anywhere," said
Lee Kai-fu, Google's vice-president, at a press briefing in
Beijing.
In China, Google is a distant second in search behind market
leader Baidu.com, whose market share is three times larger than
Google's.
China Mobile, having slashed its charges in recent years, is
desperate to find new sources for income outside its traditional
services.
Although Google declined to disclose any details of the deal,
Lee said its cooperation with China Mobile was just the
beginning.
"From Google's earlier experience in the global market, our next
step in cooperating with telecom carriers usually focuses on making
possible the traditional Internet search services on common mobile
phones."
Google has previously formed partnerships with numerous telecom
carriers such as Vodafone in Europe, KDDI in Japan, Bharti Airtel
in India and Sprint in the United States.
Last month, the company signed an agreement with Chunghwa
Telecom Co Ltd, the largest telecom carrier in Taiwan Province, to
provide a search engine on its "emome" mobile platform.
"China has great potential for mobile search since there are far
more cell phone users than Internet users in the country," said
Zhang Dongming, research director of BDA China.
According to government figures, China possessed 123 million
Internet users at the end of last June, up from 111 million in
2005. However, the country's mobile phone users dwarf these figures
surpassing 462 million last year, creating a huge pool of consumers
that few Internet companies could afford to lose.
Last November, Microsoft agreed to provide its Live Search
services to China Telecom. Baidu, Google's biggest rival in China,
also signed deals last year with Nokia and Haier to offer Baidu's
mobile search products on several Chinese cell phone models. Other
Chinese search engines such as Cgogo, iAsk and sogou are also
offering mobile search services.
"I think mobile search may have the same importance as Internet
search in the future due to its unique mobility and the relatively
low cost of facilities," said Lee, noting that the true potential
of the mobile search market may be undervalued by many
analysts.
According to domestic firm CCID Consulting, the revenue of
China's mobile search market should top 173 million yuan in 2006,
an increase of 642.3 percent year-on-year. The firm estimated that
this figure would soar to 758 million yuan by 2008.
Another consulting firm, iResearch, is even more bullish in its
predictions. It said that the revenue of China's mobile search
market would surpass 1.35 billion yuan in 2008 and 3.1 billion in
2010.
On Thursday, Xunlei, a Shenzhen-based peer-to-peer file sharing
network operator, said Google Inc. will buy a stake in the company
but declined to reveal the details of the deal. Google is
reportedly partnering with Ceyuan Ventures, a Shanghai-based
venture capital firm for the investment.
(China Daily January 5, 2007)