China's most popular search engine Baidu company, operating on Tuesday said it would buy smartphone apps wireless distributor 91 is $ 190 million U.S. dollars, increased rapidly growing Chinese mobile Internet market competition.
Headquartered in Beijing, Baidu said it would acquire companies with 91 wireless network NetDragon Websoft Co., Ltd., China game developers 57%, the rest from other shareholders.
91 wireless business in China's two smartphone application distribution platform, 91 assistants and HiMarket, said to have been used for more than one billion applications downloaded. The company says it is China's largest third-party application active users, the cumulative download distributor.
China has the world's largest population of Internet users, online at the end of last year's 564 million people, according to government data. The number of people who go to use mobile phones, tablet PCs and other wireless devices online last year grew 18% to $ 42 billion.
Baidu accounted for nearly 80 percent of China's market share in the traditional Internet search. But it faces stiff competition in the mobile search, its market share has been eroded.
Baidu mobile search share dropped from 77.5% in March to 66.9% in July last year. Then in mid-2012 launch of the competitor's service, quickly won market share more than 13% of information security company Qihoo 360.
Headquartered in Beijing, Baidu has been extended to music downloads from the search, online video and other services.
In May this year, announced the acquisition of Internet video services PPS Network $ 370 million. It says it already has iQiyi.com services combined, will make China the largest mobile video platform, the number of users.
Reflected in the fierce competition, Baidu said its earnings rose 8.5 percent over last year, but in the three months ended March, from the previous quarter's 36% growth dropped significantly. The company said that research and development costs increased by 83%.
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