Asia + mobile = Yahoo!

Posted June 20th, 2007 at 3:17 pm by Dave Ko, Yahoo! Mobile

 5 Comments / Filed in: Conferences/Events, Trends & News

Greetings from Asia, where mobile phones are as ubiquitous as shoes. And where Yahoo! just got a tremendous leg up in the mobile Internet market.

I’m writing from CommunicAsia 2007 in Singapore, where I just finished a full-day of meetings with press, analysts, and partners from across Asia. We all spent the day fixated on the future of mobile search and agreed that that the next phase is dependent on a consumer-friendly, intuitive service designed specifically for the mobile device.

We’ve created such a service with Yahoo! oneSearch. And as of today, 100 million more mobile phone subscribers in Asia have access to this service through partnerships we’ve struck with six major operators. Searching and finding via mobile phone got infinitely easier for people in the Philippines, India, Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Taiwan.

These carrier agreements make oneSearch the default mobile search service on our partner WAP sites and reinforce our leadership in markets where mobile phones are incredibly pervasive and where there’s an increasing demand for mobile Internet services.

Since launching oneSearch at CES in January, we’ve worked hard to localize it for this important region. We know that PC search is not mobile search and PC browsing is not mobile browsing. People want faster results, easier navigation, and local relevance. OneSearch addresses that gap and now it does so in 14 countries around the world.

We’ll also launch localized beta versions of Yahoo! Go 2.0 this Friday, bringing the cool mobile Internet app to 13 countries in Europe, Asia and the Americas.

This all gets us closer to our big audacious goal to eventually connect 1 billion mobile users worldwide. And think we’ll reach it down the road with more news like this.

Dave Ko
VP & GM, Connected Life, Asia

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5 Comments Add your own

Kate Biedron | June 21st, 2007 at 6:05 am

Hello
I have had my yahoo address for almost 10 years and have been very happy. I rely on MY Yahoo to supply most of my news. When I logged on today after returning home, I realized there is nothing on your front page talking about the orphans in Iraq!
I’m traditional. I want to hear all REAL news before I hear about Iwo To or Paris Hilton. Just the fact that is wasn’t on my homepage and I had to search for it made me wonder how many people won’t even know about it after they log in?
Thanks for listening
Kate

David | June 21st, 2007 at 12:07 pm

Hi Dave,

Thanks for the update on Connected Life.

You’d be a welcome interview on my mobile search blog.

Oscar Sousa Marques | June 25th, 2007 at 1:31 am

Dave,
Your app. looks great but it’s still not available in Macau. I work with Directel Macau, the offcial publisher of the Macau Yellow Pages, and would very much appreciate to explore ways to cooperate with your copmpany in developing the local market.
Thanks
Oscar

ha doat | March 8th, 2008 at 1:34 am

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Satya | October 2nd, 2008 at 4:10 pm

Really good article. I have been following your blog for last 3 months. You have good knowledge
on Mobile(cell phone) Industry and happenings. Please continue the good work. Thank you.