Google 3, Mozilla 0.
Once upon a time, Google played warm and fuzzy and gave non-profit Mozilla a bunch of money to embed their smooth and sexy search in Mozilla’s super-cool new browser, Firefox. So far, so good; everyone’s happy. Google search grows and they aren’t being evil, and Mozilla has the money for R&D on awesome new things.
Years pass, and Google quietly develops their own browser in-house. Plenty of people figured they might do that, but plenty of others figured there was no point - wasn’t that what the Mozilla partnership was for? Personally, I don’t know what that partnership was for. Mozilla has plenty of money for now, but Google isn’t going to be using that distribution channel after 2011, so they’re going to have to find a new source for 88% of their income. Uh-oh. Like any company whose business lies on the web, that won’t be easy.
Why did Google renew the Firefox deal right before releasing Chrome? I can’t find numbers on what kind of market share Google grabbed through the Firefox channel, but given that the open-source browser is still working on critical mass, I’m going to assume it wasn’t a great ROI for the search behemoth.
Anyway, today it appears that others are jumping on the screw-Firefox-let’s-use-Chrome bandwagon: Flock, a ’social browser’ with less market share than the discontinued Netscape (even though it’s been around for 3 years; I tried it back in ‘06 and didn’t derive any value from it. For their sake I hope it’s improved). They claim Mozilla folks are unresponsive and Chrome is easier to work with. Is this the beginning of another browser trend? Or is it a silly decision by one small company that just happened to attract TechCrunch’s attention (Flock is a TC darling, after all)? Is anyone else going this direction? I’m waiting to hear the followup on this story.
Something else to think about - the mobile web is exploding. Microsoft bundles IE with Windows Mobile , just like they do with computer operating systems. Android phones will soon offer a version of Chrome. Apple’s Safari is spreading with iPhones. Even Opera, barely found on 1 of 50 computers, has ridiculous command over the tiny screen. But who’s pushing mobile Firefox?
9:43 pm on March 2nd, 2009
You know, I wondered the exact same thing about Firefox’s lack of mobile presence just yesterday. I’m sure they must be developing something, but question is who to launch through? What do Blackberrry’s use for browsers?
1:31 am on March 3rd, 2009
I totally agree, I am pretty much sure it came as a shocker to Mozilla when Google came out with its own browser. Also it is very unlikely that Chrome might do well in this browser wars, the target audience of both Chrome and Firefox are pretty much same. So Chrome might end up stealing some market from Firefox but it won’t make much of a dent.
Chrome certainly won’t be able to compete with IE and Safari, because both come in-built with their respective OS’s. I think IE would recover the lost market this year when Windows 7 releases and by the looks IE8, it looks like a great browser.
conclusion: Firefox would survive with or without Google, they have too much goodwill to fail.
9:28 pm on March 8th, 2009
That’s OK! The software socialists (and proud of it) over at Mozilla don’t care about money, right? MS is the big evil profit-mongering company, right? Open source doesn’t sound so good when you’re not the youngest, sexiest one with unlimited unearned funds from sugar daddy any more. Boo hoo. (Dries a tear)
7:58 pm on March 30th, 2009
First rule of thumb, never underestimate Google. IE may be bundled with computers right now, but let the whole anti-trust crowd rise up again and we will see other options more readily available. I wouldn’t be surprised to see HTC bundling a Google branded browser with their phones instead of Opera within a couple of years.
4:41 pm on April 4th, 2009
Mozilla-Google partnership was mutually beneficial for both parties. Mozilla was payed by Google on a per search basis. Google made money from all the residual search advertisements which makes up the bulk of their business. I further bet that the agreement will be renewed in the recent future.
Chrome isn’t necessarily meaning to compete with FF, although it naturally will. Their original announced goal at least was to push the standards of current browsers and provide a source of innovation.
Firefox took this to heart; the next version of FF currently codenamed minefield uses a rewritten JS engine, which is much faster(they stole some other things too).
10:18 pm on April 20th, 2009
*waves Opera flag*
6:21 am on May 2nd, 2009
Firefox mobile = Fennec
It’s in BETA, so they are pushing it