The whole concept and opportunity behind Android is that mobile handsets are becoming much more than phones – they are becoming our one-stop-shop for connecting to the world. Inherently, searching information on the web is a core feature in this mobile shift and as we all know, searches are done through a web browser.
Considering these obvious facts, Google’s recent deal to replace Yahoo has the default search engine in Opera’s Mobile Browsers is absolutely humongous news from Opera. They basically paid their way to becoming the default FireFox search and speculation is that the Opera deal is similar in nature.
While the iPhone browser is Safari, Opera’s Mobile Web Browsers (Opera Mobile and Opera Mini) seem to dominate the mobile search arena. According to ReadWriteWeb, Opera Mini is a free mobile browser that over 35 million people use each month to find 1.7 Billion webpages. And Opera Mobile, the $24 premium version targeted for higher end phones in the general smart genre, has already shipped out over 100 million devices.
The bottom line of all this? Google inherits billions and billions of mobile searches on which they can now not only display their ads, but do so with android applications integration.
Some folks say the cause for excitement (for everyone except Yahoo) is a bit overstated. Some of the top reasons were pointed out by a commenter on the ReadWriteWeb article going by the name TheHarmonyGuy. Some of his strong points include:
These points were just a few of MANY he made and his main response was to a question asked in the post title, “Did Google Just Buy a Mobile Browser?”
We’d have to agree that the answer is NO. But the deal, purchase, investment, relationship, strategic partnership… whatever buzzword you want to apply to it… the bottom line is that Google is making moves to become a dominant player in the Mobile market. Every resource and tool to which they can get exclusive access provides another opportunity to integrate and cross promote Android.
So no… Google didn’t buy Opera. But they did make a significant investment to further solidify the upcoming (and we believe inevitable) success of Android. But Google isn’t the only one making moves: two weeks ago, T-Mobile announced it would start favoring Yahoo OVER Google for it’s European mobile search needs.
But when it comes down to it, Google has too much leverage, too much money and perfect timing with “Android” become the mobile we search victor no matter how the cookie crumbles.