Internet behemoths and pure-play startups are hastily inking deals and positioning themselves for a long, hard slog on the mobile search battlefield.
Yahoo Inc. continued its aggressive move into wireless last week, using the Consumer Electronics Show to tout a host of new partnerships for its Go 2.0 search offering. The Internet giant announced pacts to preload an updated version of its wireless Web software on handsets from Motorola Inc., Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. and Nokia Corp., and said it is working with Research In Motion Ltd. “to develop tighter integrations” with the company’s BlackBerry platform this year.
Yahoo also outlined a deal to serve as the mobile search service provider for Opera Software ASA, an expansion of its agreement with Hutchison Whampoa’s 3 Group and agreed to provide search technology for Apple Inc.’s high-profile the iPhone handset.
Rival Google Inc. announced its own deals with Samsung and Apple’s iPhone, as well as a potentially blockbuster agreement with China Mobile. China’s largest carrier said its Monternet WAP portal will use Google technology to deliver search services and other Internet-based offerings to its subscribers.
The announcement follows months of speculation regarding a partnership between the two giants and marks another wireless win for Google. The company serves as the landing page for “Web ‘n’ Walk,” a mobile Internet service for T-Mobile’s European customers, and Motorola has agreed to build phones with a Google-branded “hard key” that will launch a wireless Web-surfing session.
Yahoo continues to look to wireless to give it a much-needed boost against Google, which had a banner year on the fixed-line Internet in 2006 as Yahoo faltered. Yahoo offers the top mobile e-mail and directory service services in the United States, and has gained substantial traction with its news and weather services. Google, though, maintains a slight lead in the mobile search arena, according to both Telephia and M:Metrics.
But while both companies have accumulated impressive partners around the world, both are at odds-to one degree or another-with U.S. carriers. Network operators are tapping smaller, pure-play mobile companies to power white-label search offerings and, often, trying to generate revenue from search services and other offerings that are typically free on the wired Internet.
“There’s a kind of tension” between major Internet players and U.S. wireless carriers, said JupiterResearch analyst Julie Ask. “In terms of indirect search, carriers are selling applications that do that today. Google is doing it free; so are Microsoft and Yahoo, so there’s that conflict right now.”
Smaller developers are gaining traction by powering carrier-branded services on the deck. JumpTap Inc., for instance, delivers Alltel Corp.’s mobile search service, and InfoSpace Inc. powers Cingular Wireless L.L.C.’s MediaNet offering. Medio Systems Inc., which two months ago secured $30 million in venture funding, last week agreed to power a content-search service for T-Mobile USA Inc.’s t-zones portal; Medio’s other carrier customers include Verizon Wireless and Canadian carrier Telus Mobility.
Even in the early days of the mobile Internet, though, third-party providers are attracting impressive traffic. More than 5 million U.S. subscribers a month used Google’s mobile search service during the third quarter of 2006, according to M:Metrics, and 4.3 million accessed Yahoo’s search offering. Others vying for space on the playground include Ask.com, 4INFO and go2, an Irvine, Calif.-based company that last week claimed to deliver its 1 billionth page-view.
As users grow more accustomed to surfing the wireless Web, off-deck search services are sure to draw more traffic. And Yahoo and Google not only bring high-profile brands to wireless, they also bring proven business models and vast advertiser relationships. What’s more, both are working to blur the lines between wireless and fixed-line services. Yahoo, for instance, offers a “send to phone” feature that allows users to send driving directions and other information from a computer to a mobile phone. And Google has developed an impressive mobile version of its popular mapping service.
“(Google and Yahoo) are pretty savvy.. They’ve already got the infrastructure in place to sell keywords, advertisers know them, they’ve worked with them before, they know the terms of the deal,” said Ask. “I think in three or five years (mobile search) will look very different than it does today. They’re offering free versions of what the carriers want you to pay for. It’s hard to believe consumers are going to pay long-term.”
