Bottom line: Baidu's massive ad cleanup in May and shuttering of a site for travelers reflects ongoing pressure on its core ad-dependent search business while spotlighting its inability to branch into non-search areas.
Search giant Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) is in a couple of headlines as we head into the latter part of the week, reflecting two major challenges the company is facing. The larger headline says the company has just removed millions of ads, a whopping 237 million to be precise, for rea...
.Bottom line: Baidu's first-ever loss since going public reflects a long-anticipated decline for its core search business, which could mark the start of a longer-term decline due to lack of a strong new business lines.
It seems that profits are increasingly hard to come by these days on China's Internet. That's the major takeaway coming in the latest results from search giant Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU), which has just posted its first loss since becoming a publicly listed company 14 years ago. Perha...
.Bottom line: A major new campaign calling on Google to abandon its plan to return to China's search market will add pressure on the company to reconsider its decision, but is unlikely to succeed unless the pressure grows significantly stronger.
If Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) CEO Sundar Pichai thought he could quietly launch a new filtered China search engine without any major backlash, he's quickly finding out otherwise. The search giant's controversial plan to return to the world's biggest search ...
.Bottom line: Google's decision to finally talk openly about its plan to return to China looks smart though slightly late, by explaining the desperate need for alternatives in the massive though tightly controlled search market.
After staying mum on the subject for quite some time, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) is finally speaking out on its controversial decision to return to the China search market. Its CEO Sundar Pichai broke the company's silence on the matter at an event this week sponsored by Wi...
.Bottom line: An internal petition calling on Google to be more transparent about its plans to return to China represents the first major backlash to the move, but is unlikely to dissuade the company from going ahead.
When the news first broke a couple of weeks ago that Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) was planning a return to China's search market, many predicted that western sources would be quick to criticize the plan, even though few voices have actually spoken out so far. Fast forward a couple of we...
.Bottom line: iQiyi's establishment of a new sports joint venture and the venture's subsequent 500 million yuan in funding point to a measured expansion for its premium content business, which will be key to its future success.
I'm being just a bit coy with today's headline by suggesting that a new sports programming joint venture by online video site iQiyi (Nasdaq: IQ) resembles a similar expansion by disgraced former rival LeEco (Shenzhen: 300104). But the fact of the matter is that these t...
.Bottom line: A new report on Google's plan to launch a new China search engine within the next year looks credible, and underscores the company's decision to put the market's big potential ahead of the negative backlash such a move will bring.
A story in a publication called the Intercept is making big waves in China, saying search giant Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) is preparing a major about-face on its decision to leave the country's large but highly controlled search market. (English article) Whi...
.Bottom line: Baidu's withdrawal from Brazil reflects a broader inability of Chinese companies to succeed overseas due to their different practices and local wariness about their ability to protect user privacy.
In what is probably coming as a surprise to no one, media reports are saying that search leader Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) is pulling out of Brazil. This would represent the company's latest failure abroad, and is really part of a broader string of failures not only for the company but China...
.Bottom line: The departure of Lu Qi from Baidu could deal a setback to some of the company's less advanced and more ambitious efforts in artificial intelligence.
Just a year after being named as the man who would lead search leader Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) into a future filled with artificial intelligence (AI), Lu Qi has abruptly abandoned his post as the company's COO. Investors were clearly spooked by the move, dumping Baidu's stock on Friday to the tune of a nearly 10 percent drop, the kind o...
.Bottom line: Baidu's reorganization of its mapping unit reflects growing competition in the space, and could ultimately end in a shuttering of the service if its usage continues to decline.
The wheels of restlessness at online search leader Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) are grinding into motion once more, with word that the company has made a major shift in its popular mapping division. Company watchers will know the restlessness to which I refer is a direct reference to Baidu's founder Robin Li, who...
.Bottom line: Baidu's anti-competitive behavior alleged in a lawsuit by Jinri Toutiao won't have a long-term effect on its stock, but will draw the attention of an increasingly assertive anti-trust regulator.
A humorous war of words has broken out between search leader Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) and news aggregating app Jinri Toutiao, also sometimes called Today's Headlines, over unfair competition in the form of search manipul...
Bottom line: Google's campaign to build a China-based artificial intelligence team is at least partly designed to woo Beijing, as part of its broader effort to get permission to open a China-based Google Play app store.
In the latest signal of its move back to China, Internet titan Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) is apparently on a hiring spree in Beijing that looks aimed at building up an artificial intelligence (AI) team in the world's largest o...
Bottom line: JD.com's Thai joint venture looks like a smart move into Southeast Asia, though it shouldn't move too aggressively abroad and instead focus on becoming profitable.
China's big Internet companies have a pretty varied record for expanding abroad. At one extreme there's Alibaba (NYSE: BABA), which is using its big cash pot to buy a wide range of assets concentrated mostly in East and South Asia. Tencent (HKEx: 700) is in the middle, m...
Bottom line: Baidu could announce a sale of its takeout dining unit to Ele.me by the end of the month, in a smart exit that will leave the industry with two major players and could result in a major write-off for Baidu.
In a move that's been a long time coming, media are reporting that search giant Baidu (Nasdaq: BIDU) is on the cusp of a deal to unload its aging takeout delivery service to rival Ele.me, in a deal that would essentially wh...