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Yahoo’s series of announcements last Wednesday at CommunicAsia 2007 in Singapore point to a renewed focus of the company on all things mobile. Google has already overtaken Yahoo! in search and social networking, but one of the earliest Internet companies in the world has realised that it needs to go mobile… and fast.
Asia is undoubtedly the most promising mobile market and Yahoo! has launched the latest version of its mobile application, Yahoo! Go 2.0, in 13 countries in Europe and Asia. The company has talked to handset manufacturers Nokia, Motorola, Samsung, LG, RIM (Blackberry) and HTC to pre-load Yahoo! Go 2.0 on 200 mobile phone models by the end of July. It aims to double that number by the end of 2007.
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David Ko |
Yahoo’s other bet is Yahoo! oneSearch, which it launched in seven Asian countries, including India, in May. The oneSearch portal can be accessed on WAP on GPRS-enabled mobile phones. It combines image, Internet and mobile web results. Now the company has tied up with six mobile operators, including Idea Cellular in India, to make Yahoo! oneSearch available to their subscribers. Yahoo! is targeting a subscriber base of 100 million through these partnerships. It will customise the oneSearch page for each of these operators. More such tie-ups are expected in the coming months.
At CommunicAsia 2007, Yahoo! made it clear that it was trying to hit Google where it hurt most. Google has not been as big a success story on the mobile as on the web, especially in search. The strategic shift may also be seen in the context of Terry Semel’s resignation as CEO of Yahoo! and co-founder Jerry Yang taking over the mantle. It’s clear that Yahoo’s shareholders were not happy with Semel’s inability to tackle the Google threat. The speculation that the company would be taken over by Microsoft (presumably to beat Google) did not help either.
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Yahoo! Go 2.0 |
Speaking to agencyfaqs! at CommunicAsia 2007, David Ko, general manager and vice-president, Connected Life Asia, Mobile and Broadband, said that the decision had more to do with advertising trends. “Similar to the Internet, advertisers are demanding mass advertising on the mobile. They want a one-stop shop where they can place mobile ads instead of going separately to operators, handset manufacturers and aggregators. Yahoo! can do that for them through its mobile platforms.”
Considering that there are a number of local mobile applications like Webaroo’s Web to Go and Onyomo mobile search already in the market, hasn’t Yahoo! arrived late? No, says Ko, “we still have the edge because our products are scaleable to meet the consumers’ needs. It will get more competitive in the Indian market, but competition is good!”
Manish Dalal, senior director, broadband partnerships at Yahoo!, adds, “Small companies can build small applications. It takes a huge investment to build an in-depth mobile search that provides relevant results and we are confident about Yahoo! oneSearch.”
He also added that Yahoo’s R&D centre in Bangalore is working closely with that in Singapore, and will be announcing more mobile products in future – some an extension of its web products, and others that are built purely for mobile.
(This correspondent was at CommunicAsia 2007, Singapore, at the invitation of Yahoo! India.)
© 2010 afaqs!
