Google Inc, owner of the world's most-used Internet search engine, plans to open a center in Shanghai to help expand its database and add services to challenge Baidu.com Inc (百度) in the world's second-biggest Web market.
The development facility, its second in China, may open this year, Johnny Chou, Greater China region president of sales and business development for Google, said yesterday by telephone. Chou declined to give an investment figure or say how many people the center would employ.
Google is trying to win market share from Baidu, the most used search site in China, by hiring more engineers to increase the size of its Chinese-language search database and to introduce more local services.
The Internet search market in China is expected to generate sales of 5.62 billion yuan (US$704 million) next year, up from 3.62 billion yuan this year, according to Shanghai-based research company IResearch Inc.
"China is a very important market and Google has a long-term commitment to China," Allen Wang, head of Asia Pacific marketing for Mountain View, California-based Google, said yesterday by telephone.
The company's Web site yesterday had ads seeking applicants for two engineering positions, a salesperson, public relations and tech support in Shanghai.
Google is also looking to hire someone to head the Shanghai center, Chou said.
Google had hired Lee Kai-Fu (
Lee had joined Microsoft in 1998 and oversaw the set-up of the company's software development center in Beijing.
Google's Beijing development center opened in the third quarter last year. The company plans to have "thousands of people" at the Beijing center, Google chief executive officer Eric Schmidt said in April, without giving a timetable for the hiring.
The search engine is also looking at locations in Shanghai for its center, Wang said.
Baidu has introduced a Web log, or blog, service similar to MySpace.com and an Internet encyclopedia similar to Wikipedia to attract users. The Beijing-based company's development spending more than doubled from a year earlier in the second quarter to 133.6 million yuan.
Zhang Yazhou was sitting in the passenger seat of her Tesla Model 3 when she said she heard her father’s panicked voice: The brakes do not work. Approaching a red light, her father swerved around two cars before plowing into a sport utility vehicle and a sedan, and crashing into a large concrete barrier. Stunned, Zhang gazed at the deflating airbag in front of her. She could never have imagined what was to come: Tesla Inc sued her for defamation for complaining publicly about the vehicles brakes — and won. A Chinese court ordered Zhang to pay more than US$23,000 in
‘LEGACY CHIPS’: Chinese companies have dramatically increased mature chip production capacity, but the West’s drive for secure supply chains offers a lifeline for Taiwan When Powerchip Technology Corp (力晶科技) entered a deal with the eastern Chinese city of Hefei in 2015 to set up a new chip foundry, it hoped the move would help provide better access to the promising Chinese market. However, nine years later, that Chinese foundry, Nexchip Semiconductor Corp (合晶集成), has become one of its biggest rivals in the legacy chip space, leveraging steep discounts after Beijing’s localization call forced Powerchip to give up the once-lucrative business making integrated circuits for Chinese flat panels. Nexchip is among Chinese foundries quickly winning market share in the crucial US$56.3 billion industry of so-called legacy
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday held its first board of directors meeting in the US, at which it did not unveil any new US investments despite mounting tariff threats from US President Donald Trump. Trump has threatened to impose 100 percent tariffs on Taiwan-made chips, prompting market speculation that TSMC might consider boosting its chip capacity in the US or ramping up production of advanced chips such as those using a 2-nanometer technology process at its Arizona fabs ahead of schedule. Speculation also swirled that the chipmaker might consider building its own advanced packaging capacity in the US as part
‘NO DISRUPTION’: A US trade association said that it was ready to work with the US administration to streamline the program’s requirements and achieve shared goals The White House is seeking to renegotiate US CHIPS and Science Act awards and has signaled delays to some upcoming semiconductor disbursements, two sources familiar with the matter told reporters. The people, along with a third source, said that the new US administration is reviewing the projects awarded under the 2022 law, meant to boost US domestic semiconductor output with US$39 billion in subsidies. Washington plans to renegotiate some of the deals after assessing and changing current requirements, the sources said. The extent of the possible changes and how they would affect agreements already finalized was not immediately clear. It was not known