Mozilla switches from Google to Yahoo for next five years

Posted on Thursday, November 20 2014 @ 15:10 CET by Thomas De Maesschalck
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Mozilla announced it entered a strategic partnership with Yahoo, which will become the default search engine of Firefox for the next five years. The deal marks the end of a 10-year long partnership with Google.

While Yahoo will become the default search engine for US users of Firefox, this is not necessarily the case in other countries. Mozilla says it will adopt a more local and flexible approach, which includes making Yandex the default search in Russia and Baidu the default option in China. Of course, users will always be able to change the default search engine with the click of a few buttons.
Google has been the Firefox global search default since 2004. Our agreement came up for renewal this year, and we took this as an opportunity to review our competitive strategy and explore our options.

In evaluating our search partnerships, our primary consideration was to ensure our strategy aligned with our values of choice and independence, and positions us to innovate and advance our mission in ways that best serve our users and the Web. In the end, each of the partnership options available to us had strong, improved economic terms reflecting the significant value that Firefox brings to the ecosystem. But one strategy stood out from the rest. Promoting Choice and Innovation

Today we are announcing a change to our strategy for Firefox search partnerships. We are ending our practice of having a single global default search provider. We are adopting a more local and flexible approach to increase choice and innovation on the Web, with new and expanded search partnerships by country.


About the Author

Thomas De Maesschalck

Thomas has been messing with computer since early childhood and firmly believes the Internet is the best thing since sliced bread. Enjoys playing with new tech, is fascinated by science, and passionate about financial markets. When not behind a computer, he can be found with running shoes on or lifting heavy weights in the weight room.



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