The chances of the search outfit Google in China getting the sort of market share it enjoys in the rest of the world has suddenly become more remote after the Government backed Xinhua News Agency said it will launch its own search engine.
Xinhua said it signed a framework agreement with China Mobile, the world's biggest phone carrier by subscribers, to set up a search and international media company. It said work has reached a "substantive operation" stage. It did not say if the plan was aimed at the Internet or at mobile phone-based search but it could easily be for both.
According to Reuters, the communist government is trying to build up Chinese technology industries and at the same time is giving Xinhua and other state media billions of dollars to expand their presence in foreign markets.
Google China market share, has declined since the U.S. company closed its mainland search engine in March to avoid cooperating with Beijing's Web censorship. Mainland Web surfers can use Google's Chinese-language Hong Kong site but many are defecting to local rivals such as Baidu which operates China's most popular search engine.
New state backed rival
Nick Farell
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