easou

Have you already heard of Easou? You may not be familiar with this name, though it's China's top mobile search engine.

Easou leads the Chinese mobile search market

As you know, Baidu and Google largely dominate China's online search market. However, when it comes to mobile search, Easou leads.

Easou was founded in Shenzhen in 2005 by Wang Xi as the first mobile search engine company in China. It became the biggest player of the mobile search industry.

Easou & mobile search expected to boom

Mobile search engines currently account for only a fraction of total mobile applications. However, the growth rate is expected to reach 60% in 2011 according to the market research firm International Data Corporation (IDC). 

In 2010, Easou's market share was over 35%, followed by Baidu at 25%, and Google at only 5%, according to China Mobile Data Center.

Easou currently has more than 160 million users. Its sales revenue was 100 million yuan (approximately $15 million) in 2010 and the company expects to reach 1 billion yuan in 2012. 

Easou's success to be confirmed

The promotion strategy used by Easou is unlike most other IT companies. They chose to focus on the countryside rather than large cities, as Chairman Mao Zedong's theory.

SMEs account for about 80% of Easou's business and have been the key drivers of the growth. Indeed, Easou allows them to promote their products nationwide on the mobile search engine rather than spending millions of yuan on TV advertisements. 

Easou has a market penetration of more than 40 cities in China, and the company is expected to enter large cities, such as Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou in 2011

It will then face fierce competition with Baidu and Google which develop their own mobile search engine.