What will happen if Google leaves China?
- Source: Global Times
- [22:08 January 17 2010]
- Comments
GT: Who is the biggest loser in this incident?
Xu: I can't really say Google lost much in China. Even with 30 percent of the market share here, the profit Google made in China is nothing compared to their business in the US and Europe.
Their standing up to Chinese government had great effect at home, since most Western media are backing them up.
Google may lose $350 million in China, but they are winning the heart of users at home.
For Chinese users, most of the services Google provided can be found on other search engines, so they should not have much trouble adapting to that.
But the Chinese government is now in a public image crisis because of Google.
They are in a dilemma as to how to respond. If the Chinese government condemns Google strongly, then they will be accused of being against freedom of speech.
But if they step back from the previous hard stance, it will be seen as inconsistent. Therefore the best thing to do might be to remain silent.
Liu: For individual users, we might make our decision on which search engine to use based on how handy it is or how appealing it can be.
But for a country, the consideration is much complicated. They need to consider things from a comprehensive point of view, in this case, taking Internet security into consideration, which is something non-negotiable.
Users are always looking for better services. If only someone else can provide the basic services, which were provided by Google, the users will live happily.
In the short run, Google users may feel uncomfortable without their familiar applications, but this will inspire more and better services in the long run.
We look forward to seeing the emergence of more competition in this field. The short-term winners of Google's pulling out of China should be Baidu and Microsoft.
With Google gone, 30 percent of the market would be open for competition. Baidu has the upper hand, since their technology is better adapted to searching in Chinese.
It will be exciting to see what might happen.
