There's not much likelihood of a major challenger to Google emerging from Silicon Valley or elsewhere on the Western interwebs. But there's no such luxury for China's Baidu, the dominant search engine in the nation, which is now facing an aggressive rival in the search engine space: Qihoo's 360 Search.
Baidu--which has as much as 80 percent of search engine users in China--really should've seen it coming. Qihoo has long been an aggressive company that's fascinating to watch, pushed forward by its supposedly ruthless CEO, Zhou Hongyi (pictured below). In just two weeks since the launch of 360 Searchfind it at 360sou.com--it has reportedly surpassed Google in market share to make it the nation's second most-used Web indexer.
It's Baidu which might have lost the greatest number of users from this, as Qihoo drives a lot of China's Web traffic via its PC Web browser and its Hao.360.cn links portal, whisking away a lot of Web users from Baidu's grasp and influence. But there's no doubt that Google might lose market share too--Google was the default search engine on Qihoo's paid links portal up until recently, and has now been usurped by Qihoo's own 360 Search.
Search engine war
This bit of argy-bargy between Baidu and Qihoo's 360 Search is actually already a full-blown Web war. It has already seen Qihoo censor "Baidu" as a search term; rumors bubbled up of Baidu looking into the feasibility of legal action; and then Qihoo stopped sending traffic to Baidu features like Baidu Maps (services which 360 Search currently lacks). It's going to get even uglier.
For Baidu, it brings up one awkward word: Monopoly. Sure, there's more choice of search engines in China than perhaps anywhere else, but Baidu's dominant position in the market allows Qihoo execs to throw that label at Baidu's head--and it sticks.
China's Web space has always been a lot more ferocious than anything the US could muster, with a legion of strong Web companies and portals--Tencent, Baidu, Alibaba, Qihoo, Sina, Sohu, Netease--which move quickly and are ready to adapt (or steal) ideas from startups or each other, and can diversify into a new market in the blink of an eye. Forget the image of olde worlde portals being lumbering dinosaurs--like Yahoo--because China's Web giants are more like Usain Bolt with the wind behind him.
Baidu's CEO, Robin Li, needs to have a few Red Bulls and think of ways to raise the barriers to entry to other markets Qihoo will almost inevitably soon invade. Perhaps into online maps. Or online ads. That'll involve a lot more treading on Baidu's toes. And on Google's. And Tencent's. But apparently, Qihoo's Zhou Hongyi quite enjoys making enemies.
About the Blogger
Six years after arriving in China to 'check it out', Steven has decided to stay longer, and is hooked on the fast-changing dynamic of mainland China. A freelance editor, lifestyle magazine writer and tech blogger, he can also be found on twitter (as @SirSteven) discussing media, tech and music. You can email him - sino...@gmail.com (< click on the first half of the address to reveal it all) - with any tips, queries or feedback. You might also like to check out the CNET Asia fanpage on Facebook.
No comments:
Post a Comment