Sohu joins search engine battle

Sogou.com, the online search engine operated by NASDAQ-listed Sohu.com Inc, announced Friday that it would join the battle between China's search engine leader Baidu Inc and a latecomer in the sector, Qihoo 360 Technology Co.

"Sogou.com must join the battle," Zhang Chaoyang, CEO of Sohu.com Inc, said on his verified Sohu Weibo account Friday.

You Tianyu, an analyst at Beijing-based research company iResearch Consulting, told the Global Times that the participation of sogou.com would further intensify competition in the sector, which might bring better user experience.

"By making the announcement, Zhang also aims to remind Internet users that sogou.com is also an important player in the online search market," You said, noting the executive's move might be aimed at promoting Sohu's search engine among Internet users.

Sogou.com ranked third in China's online search market at the end of the second quarter of this year with a market share of 2.9 percent, after Baidu and Google, data from consulting firm Analysys International showed.

Analysts noted that as competition in the sector further intensifies, Baidu's search traffic will be affected in the short term. And given that 360 service and Baidu have been blocking links from each other, user experience will also be affected.

Internet security service and software provider Qihoo 360 introduced its search engine 360 service on August 16, and on Friday, the search engine announced its independent domain name 360sou.com for its search engine.

The new search engine has gained a significant share since its establishment. By August 28, it had taken about 10 percent of China's online search market, while Baidu's share had dropped to 55.46 percent from 64.9 percent during the same period, according to independent data provider Hitwise.

"But Baidu still enjoys wide brand recognition, high user loyalty as well as a mature marketing system, therefore its dominance of the sector will not be changed in a short term," Dong Xu, an industry analyst at Analysys International, told the Global Times in an e-mailed statement.

Data from Hitwise show that Google still owns some 7 percent of the mainland's online search market, as some users still rely very much on its search engine for languages other than Chinese. But You noted that the market will be mainly dominated by Chinese companies in the future, and Google's share may further decline.

Google quit the mainland's market in 2010, and mainland users who want to search Google are redirected to the company's server in Hong Kong. "Google seems to have given up its efforts in the mainland search market," said You, adding that other search engines, such as bing.com, also lack competitive edge over domestic players.