In the last year, the relationship between the world's leading search engine, Google, and the world's largest country has been an interesting one, particularly in the light of China's stringent censorship laws. Google's latest ventures in the Chinese market however, have proved crucial, firstly with the search engine's investment into Shenzen Xunlei Network Technology, a video download service, and now through a new partnership with China Mobile. The latter will allow mobile users access to Google on the Chinese cellular provider's online portals and sites. While these developments are exciting, it is important to remember that Google have only a relatively small market share in Asia. Moreover, they'll have to battle hard against their main rival in Chinese search, Baidu.
But why are Google interested in mobile search and why have they chosen this approach with which to enter China? The answer isn't difficult to pin down: in such a booming market, the quickest path to market dominance is accessibility. If you attempt to control any already-saturated search market based solely on service, you're pitching a long and expensive campaign. However, if you can find a less-competitive means into the market, your battle is half over. On their part, Google have chosen their path very carefully and will reap very large rewards if they can pull off the move into mobile search in China.
The basic idea is to draw a distinction between a PC search service and a mobile search service, with a home or work PC providing information in a specific location and a mobile device being able to keep up with people on the move. As a result, Google mobile search will compete with current search engines on a different playing field than the desktop, where it would have to overcome such factors as favourites, bookmarks, caches and user habits.
But if your mobile allows you to search from any location and the search service your mobile is using is impressive, then how likely is it that you'll ditch your old search engine at work or at home for the new service?
Google's use of mobiles as a back-door to search engine users is not a new idea and has been tried and tested in other countries before being rolled out in China. However, there is also a much greater commercial aspect to mobile search than the obvious mobility it allows users. What happens when someone can't afford a computer? What happens when a high percentage of a country's population, as in China, don't have access to computers and hence the internet and their search engines? They can now access Google from their phone.
