Google loses ground to Baidu

Google is underperforming in China’s booming search engine market, a recent survey has found.

According to Xinhau, Google’s share of China’s Internet search engine market is rapidly being eroded by its Chinese rival Baidu.com Inc, the quasi-government China Internet Network Information Centre (CNNIC) said yesterday.

Baidu.com has managed to increase its market share by at least 10 per cent during the past six months in three major Chinese cities Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou which account for the vast majority of China’s Internet population, the survey by CNNIC showed.

“Google is losing to Baidu.com though the number of Chinese users of Google remains largely unchanged,” said Lu Weigang, a well-known Internet analyst who headed the CNNIC survey.