Sina Corp to Partner with Google
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Written By Emily Koh | June 11, 2007 | Share This
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Sina Corp, one of China’s largest Internet portals, and Google announced that they will team up to work together in providing news, advertising and search services in China.
“Sina is the most influential portal in China and a household brand in China’s Internet industry,” said Kai-Fu Lee, vice president of Google and president of Google China. “The strategic partnership with Sina is just another example of Google’s continuous localization efforts in China.”
The partnership will “initially” allow Google users to have easier access to Sina’s news content, while Google’s search service will be embedded into Sina’s search box, enabling users to switch between online content and web page searches. The partnership will eventually expand to news and other content areas.
Google’s activities in China have carefully been followed by the news, bringing wide criticism in particular over Google’s compliance with China’s censorship policies. Google currently has 22% of the market share in China, trailing behind leader Baidu.com, which has 55% market share, according to iResearch Inc.
The announcement of the partnership also comes on the heels of
a new report released by Chinese research company Intelliconsulting, which
discovered via a blind test of 2,470 participants that nearly 50% of Chinese internet users preferred Google results over Baidu’s. Overall, participants reported a greater level of satisfaction with Google search results.
Topics: Google, Search: News |