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Kai-Fu Lee, head of Google's China operations, resigned on Friday. This brings to a close four years of controversy, as the search engine giant censored its search results in order to pick up some market share in the largest internet market in the world (by population).
The change follows fresh debate within Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) -- which claims to live by the motto "don't be evil" -- about whether to exit the Chinese market. The internal discussion is the result of another round of conflict with government authorities in China.
Yet, despite the fact that cofounder Sergey Brin is reportedly "troubled" by the censored version of Google in China, according to a Financial Times report, Lee's departure doesn't seem to be linked to a change of sentiment within the company.
Google is estimated to have approximately 30% of the search market in China, though its internal metrics suggest that 20% is more accurate. Google has struggled to capture market share from Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU), which leads the search engine industry in China. The effort has been made more difficult by several government mandates to suspend some of the site's features because they allegedly allowed access to adult content.
Lee moved to Google from Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) and is something of a celebrity in the internet space in China. When he left Microsoft, lawsuits flew, and the rivalry between the two technology companies escalated.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
9-07-2009 @ 12:10AM
ellsworth said...
Most likely he received clandestine Chinese government pressure (stick) and monetary incentives (carrot) to leave Google.
Underhanded protectionist measure is far more prevalent in Eastern, and especially Chinese culture than in the West.
On the other hand, Google should never have trusted someone who is willing to betray Microsoft!