Baidu

Baidu 百度, Inc.
Type Public
Traded as NASDAQ: BIDU
Founded January 1, 2000
Headquarters Beijing, China
Area served Worldwide
Key people Robin Li (Chairman, CEO) [1]
Industry Internet
Revenue
Increase CNY 49.052 billion
(Dec 31, 2014) [2]
Operating income
Increase CNY 12.804 billion
(Dec 31, 2014) [2]
Total assets
Increase CNY 99.66 billion
(Dec 31, 2014) [3]
Total equity
Increase CNY 52.61 billion
(Dec 31, 2014) [3]
Employees
(Jun 30, 2014) [4]

40,500

Website www.baidu.com
Baidu

Baidu headquarters, Haidian District, Beijing
Chinese 百度

Baidu 百度, Inc. (Chinese: 百度; pinyin: Bǎidù, pronounced "BY-doo" in English), incorporated on January 18, 2000, is a Chinese web services company headquartered at the Baidu Campus in Beijing's Haidian District.[5]

Baidu offers many services, including a Chinese language-search engine for websites, audio files and images. Baidu offers 57 search and community services including Baidu Baike (an online, collaboratively-built encyclopedia) and a searchable, keyword-based discussion forum.[6] Baidu was established in 2000 by Robin Li and Eric Xu. Both of the co-founders are Chinese nationals who studied and worked overseas before returning to China. In March 2015, Baidu ranked 4th overall in the Alexa Internet rankings.[7] During Q4 of 2010, it is estimated that there were 4.02 billion search queries in China of which Baidu had a market share of 56.6%. China's Internet-search revenue share in second quarter 2011 by Baidu is 76%.[8] In December 2007, Baidu became the first Chinese company to be included in the NASDAQ-100 index.[9]

Baidu provides an index of over 740 million web pages, 80 million images, and 10 million multimedia files.[10] Baidu offers multimedia content including MP3 music, and movies, and is the first in China to offer Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) and personal digital assistant (PDA)-based mobile search.

Baidu Baike is similar to Wikipedia as an encyclopedia; however, unlike Wikipedia, only registered users can edit the articles due to Chinese laws. While access to Wikipedia has been intermittently blocked or certain articles filtered in China since June 2004, there is some controversy about the degree to which Baidu cooperates with Chinese government censorship.[11]

Name

The name Baidu is a quote from the last line of Xin Qiji's classical poem "Green Jade Table in The Lantern Festival" saying: "Having searched thousands of times in the crowd, suddenly turning back, She is there in the dimmest candlelight."

The context of the poem is that in ancient China, girls had to stay indoors, and the Lantern Festival was one of the few times they could go outside. In the chaotic sea of lantern lights, they would sneak away to meet their lovers and exchange promises to meet again next year.

A summary of the entire poem: Flowers bursting into bloom in the sky, stars falling like rain (fireworks/meteor shower), Whole streets filled with perfume, jeweled horses pulling ornate carriages, fish and dragon lanterns dancing throughout the entire night. A body decorated with golden thread and butterfly trinket, laughter that has a subtle fragrance. Having searched for this person until exhaustion, when suddenly turning back by chance, I find her standing lonely in the far end of the street in the waning light.

“ Many people have asked about the meaning of our name. 'Baidu' was inspired by a poem written more than 800 years ago during the Song Dynasty. The poem compares the search for a retreating beauty amid chaotic glamour with the search for one's dream while confronted by life's many obstacles. '...hundreds and thousands of times, for her I searched in chaos, suddenly, I turned by chance, to where the lights were waning, and there she stood.' Baidu, whose literal meaning is hundreds of times, represents persistent search for the ideal. ”

—Robin Li[12]

History

Early development

In 1994, Robin Li （李彦宏） joined IDD Information Services, a New Jersey division of Dow Jones and Company, where he helped develop software for the online edition of the Wall Street Journal.[13] He also worked on developing better algorithms for search engines and remained at IDD Information Services from May 1994 to June 1997.

In 1996, while at IDD, Li developed the RankDex site-scoring algorithm for search engines results page ranking[14][15][16] and received a US patent for the technology.[17] He later used this technology for the Baidu search engine.

In 2000, the company Baidu launched in Beijing, China. The first office was located in a hotel room, which was near Peking University from where Robin graduated.

In 2003, Baidu launched news search engine and picture search engine, adopting a special identification technology capable of identifying and grouping the articles.[18]

Domain name redirection

On January 12, 2010, Baidu.com's DNS records in the United States were altered such that browsers to baidu.com were redirected to a website purporting to be the Iranian Cyber Army, thought to be behind the attack on Twitter during the 2009 Iranian election protests, making the proper site unusable for four hours.[19] Internet users were met with a page saying "This site has been attacked by Iranian Cyber Army".[20] Chinese hackers later responded by attacking Iranian websites and leaving messages.[21] Baidu later launched legal action against Register.com for gross negligence after it was revealed that Register.com's technical support staff changed the email address for Baidu.com on the request of an unnamed individual, despite failing security verification procedures. Once the address had been changed, the individual was able to use the forgotten password feature to have Baidu's domain passwords sent directly to them, allowing them to accomplish the domain hijacking.[22][23]

Baidu workers arrested

On August 6, 2012, the BBC reported that three employees of Baidu were arrested on suspicion that they accepted bribes. The bribes were allegedly paid for deleting posts from the forum service. Four people were fired in connection with these arrests.[24]

91 Wireless acquisition

On July 16, 2013, Baidu announced its intention to purchase 91 Wireless from NetDragon. 91 Wireless is best known for its app store, but it has been reported that the app store faces piracy and other legal issues.[25] On August 14, 2013, Baidu announced that its wholly owned subsidiary Baidu (Hong Kong) Limited has signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire 91 Wireless Web-soft Limited from NetDragon Web-soft Inc.[26] for $1.85 billion in what was reported to be the biggest deal ever in China’s IT sector.[27]

2010s announcements

On July 31, 2012, Baidu announced they would team up with Sina to provide mobile search results.[28]

On November 18, 2012, Baidu announced that they would be partnering with Qualcomm to offer free cloud storage to Android users with Snapdragon processors.[29]

On August 2, 2013, Baidu launched its Personal Assistant app, designed to help CEOs, managers and the white-collar workers manage their business relationships.[30]

On July 18, 2014, the company launched a Brazilian version of the search engine, Baidu Busca.[31]

On October 9, 2014, Baidu announced acquisition of Brazilian local e-commerce site Peixe Urbano.[32]

Services

Baidu offers several services[33] to locate information, products and services using Chinese-language search terms, such as, search by Chinese phonetics, advanced search, snapshots, spell checker, stock quotes, news, knows, postbar, images, video and space information, and weather, train and flight schedules and other local information. The user-agent string of Baidu search engine is baiduspider.[34][35] Also, a Baidu application for Apple's iOS is available.[36]

Advertisements

Baidu's primary advertising product is called Baidu Tuiguang and is similar to Google Adwords and Adsense. It is a pay per click advertising platform that allows advertisers to have their ads shown in Baidu search results pages and on other websites that are part of Baidu Union.

Baidu sells its advertising products via a network of resellers.[59]

Baidu's web administrative tools are all in Chinese, which makes it tough for non-Chinese speakers to use. Recently, a third-party company began to develop a tool with an English-language interface for Baidu advertising programs.[60][61]

Moreover, the service may only be used by advertisers with a registered business address in China or in several other East Asian countries.[62]

Pay for placement (P4P)

Baidu focuses on generating revenues primarily from online marketing services. Baidu's pay for placement (P4P) platform enables its customers to reach users who search for information related to their products or services. Customers use automated online tools to create text-based descriptions of their web pages and bid on keywords that trigger the display of their webpage information and link. Baidu's P4P platform features an automated online sign-up process that customers use to activate their accounts at any time. The P4P platform is an online marketplace that introduces Internet search users to customers who bid for priority placement in the search results. Baidu also uses third-party distributors to sell some of its online marketing services to end customers and offers discounts to these distributors in consideration of their services.

Baidu offers certain consultative services, such as keyword suggestions, account management and performance reporting. Baidu suggests synonyms and associated phrases to use as keywords or text in search listings. These suggestions can improve clickthrough rates of the customer's listing and increase the likelihood that a user will enter into a transaction with the customer. Baidu also provides online daily reports of the number of clickthroughs, clicked keywords and the total costs incurred, as well as statistical reports organized by geographic region.

ProTheme

Baidu offers ProTheme services to some of its Baidu Union members, which enable these members to display on their properties its customers' promotional links that are relevant to the subject and content of such members' properties. Baidu generates revenues from ProTheme services based on the number of clicks on its customers' links and share the revenues with its Baidu Union members in accordance with pre-agreed terms. Baidu's fixed-ranking services allow customers to display query-sensitive text links at a designated location on its search results pages. Its Targetizement services enable customers to reach their targeted Internet users by displaying their advertisements only when their targeted Internet users browse Baidu's certain Web pages.

Baidu TV

Baidu operates its advertising service, Baidu TV, in partnership with Ads it! Media Corporation, an online advertising agency and technology company. Baidu TV provides advertisers access to the websites of its Baidu Union members, allowing advertisers to choose Websites on which they post their video advertisements with the aid of its advertisement targeting and matching system. It also offers a brand advertising service, Brand-Link. In June 2008, Baidu launched My Marketing Center, a customized platform integrating industry information, market trends and business, and industry news and reports to assist existing customers in their sales and marketing efforts. Other forms of its online advertising services allow customers to display query sensitive and non-query sensitive advertisements on its websites, including graphical advertisements.

Baidu Union

Baidu Union consists of several third-party websites and software applications.[63] Union members incorporate a Baidu search box or toolbar and match its sponsored links with the content on their properties. Their users can conduct search via the Baidu search box or toolbar and can click the sponsored links located on their properties. Baidu has also launched programs through which it displays the online advertising of its customers on Baidu Union websites, and share the fees generated by these advertisements with the owners of these Baidu Union websites. As of May 2011, there were 230 thousand partner websites that displayed Baidu Union ads on their websites.[64]

Competition

Baidu[65] competes with 360 Search (www.haosou.com), Sogou Search (www.sogou.com), Google China, Yahoo! China, Microsoft's Bing and MSN Messenger, Sina, Wikipedia, NetEase's Youdao, Tencent's Soso.com and PaiPai, Alibaba’s Taobao, TOM Online, and EachNet.

Baidu is the No. 1 search engine in China, controlling 63 percent of China's market share as of January 2010, according to iResearch.[66] The number of Internet users in China had reached 513 million by the end of December 2011, according to a report by the China Internet Network Information Center.[67]

In an August 2010 Wall Street Journal article,[68] Baidu played down its benefit from Google's having moved its China search service to Hong Kong, but Baidu's share of revenue in China's search-advertising market grew six percentage points in the second quarter to 70%, according to Beijing-based research firm Analysys International.

It is also evident that Baidu is attempting to enter the Internet social network market. As of 2011, it is discussing the possibility of working with Facebook, which would lead to a Chinese version of the international social network, managed by Baidu.[69] This plan, if executed, would face off Baidu with competition from the three popular Chinese social networks pengyou.com, Renren[70] and Kaixin001[71] as well as induce rivalry with instant-messaging giant, Tencent QQ.[72]

On February 22, 2012, Hudong submitted a complaint to the State Administration for Industry and Commerce asking for a review of the behavior of Baidu, accusing it of being monopolistic.[73]

On January 9, 2013, Baidu was still number one in the market, with 64.5% of the users, the closest competitor, Qihoo 360, who launched its own search engine in August, has already taken hold of 10.2% users. Following are Google and Sogou.[74]

By August 2014, Baidu's search market share in China has dropped to 56.3%, where Qihoo 360, its closest competitor who has rebranded its search engine as haosou.com, has increased its market share to 29.0%, according to report from CNZZ.com. [75]

Research and patents

Baidu has started to invest in deep-learning research and is integrating new deep-learning technology into some of its apps and products, including Phoenix Nest. Phoenix Nest is Baidu's ad-bidding platform.[76]

In April 2012 Baidu applied for a patent for its "DNA copyright recognition" technology. This technology automatically scans files that are uploaded by Internet users, and recognizes and filters out content that may violate copyright law. This allows Baidu to offer an infringement-free platform.[77][78]

Baidu has applied for a utility patent in the UK, for its proprietary site-wise search technology which is currently available in China.

Censorship

According to the China Digital Times, Baidu has a long history of being the most proactive and restrictive online censor in the search arena. Documents leaked in April 2009 from an employee in Baidu's internal monitoring and censorship department show a long list of blocked websites and censored topics on Baidu search.[79]

In May 2011, pro-democracy activists sued Baidu for violating the U.S. constitution by the censorship it conducts in accord with the demand of the Chinese government.[80] A U.S. judge has ruled[81] that the Chinese search engine Baidu has the right to block pro-democracy works from its query results, dismissing a lawsuit that sought to punish the company for Internet censorship.[82]

See also

References

  1. ↑ http://ir.baidu.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=188488&p=irol-govmanage
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 http://ir.baidu.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=188488&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1903991&highlight=
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_files/IROL/18/188488/2012_20F.pdf
  4. ↑ http://ir.baidu.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=188488&p=irol-faq_pf#26139--Number_of_Employees
  5. ↑ "IR Contacts." Baidu. Retrieved on December 27, 2010. "Address: Baidu Campus, No. 10, Shangdi 10th Street, Haidian District, Beijing 100085 People's Republic of China."
  6. ↑ "Baidu's 57 Products/Services: Introduction and History". China Analyst (CNAnalyst.com).
  7. ↑ "Alexa Top 500 Global Sites". Retrieved May 15, 2014.
  8. ↑ "The China Perspective, "China Economic Watch"". }
  9. ↑ Chmielewski, Dawn C. (December 10, 2007). "Search site moves at the speed of China". Los Angeles Times.
  10. ↑ "MSN Money – BIDU". MSN Money. Archived from the original on May 1, 2006. Retrieved 2006-05-11.
  11. ↑ Branigan, Tania. "Google to end censorship in China over cyber-attacks". Guardian. Retrieved 3 February 2014.
  12. ↑ "The Baidu Story". Baidu.
  13. ↑ "Robin Li's vision powers Baidu's Internet search dominance", Taipei Times, September 17, 2006.
  14. ↑ Greenberg, Andy, "The Man Who's Beating Google", Forbes magazine, October 5, 2009
  15. ↑ Yanhong Li, "Toward a Qualitative Search Engine," IEEE Internet Computing, vol. 2, no. 4, pp. 24–29, July/Aug. 1998, doi:10.1109/4236.707687
  16. ↑ "About: RankDex", rankdex.com
  17. ↑ USPTO, "Hypertext Document Retrieval System and Method", US Patent number: 5920859, Inventor: Yanhong Li, Filing date: Feb 5, 1997, Issue date: Jul 6, 1999
  18. ↑ "Baidu Launched News Search Engine and Pictures Search Engine".
  19. ↑ "Baidu hacked by 'Iranian cyber army'". BBC News. 2010-01-12. Archived from the original on January 13, 2010. Retrieved 2010-01-12.
  20. ↑ "China's top search engine Baidu hacked". People's Daily. January 12, 2010.
  21. ↑ Branigan, Tania (January 12, 2010). "'Iranian' hackers paralyse Chinese search engine Baidu". The Guardian (London).
  22. ↑ Baidu Sues Register.com, Alleges Negligence in Hacking Attack
  23. ↑ "Baidu: Registrar 'incredibly' changed our e-mail for hacker," Computer World, February 24, 2010. Accessed December 13, 2010.
  24. ↑ "BBC News - Baidu workers arrested for 'deleting posts for money'". Bbc.co.uk. 2012-08-06. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  25. ↑ Hsu, Alex (16 Jul 2013). "91 Wireless’ App Store Has Piracy and Other Legal Issues". BrightWire News.
  26. ↑ Baidu Signs Definitive Agreement to Acquire NetDragon's Subsidiary 91 Wireless,Baidu Press Releases, August 14, 2013
  27. ↑ Paul Carsten (14 August 2013). "Baidu says agrees to buy Netdragon's 91 Wireless for $1.85 billion". Reuters.
  28. ↑ Sina http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19061997 "Sina and Baidu team up in China to focus on mobile" date: July 31, 2012
  29. ↑ "Baidu and Qualcomm partner to offer free cloud storage". Geeks Hut. 2012-11-19. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  30. ↑ Baidu Launch Personal Assistant App for Android Phones,CHINA INTERNET WATCH, August 6, 2013
  31. ↑ Paul Bischoff (2014-07-18). "China web giant Baidu launches search engine in Brazil". Tech In Asia. Retrieved 2014-08-04.
  32. ↑ "China's Baidu buys control of Brazil's Peixe Urbano in expansion push". Reuters. 2014-12-04.
  33. ↑ Baidu products
  34. ↑ "关于baiduspider". baidu.com. March 18, 2009.
  35. ↑ "Baiduspider User-Agent String". HttpUserAgent.org. March 17, 2009.
  36. ↑ Baidu MobileBy Beijing Baidu Netcom Science & Technology Co., Ltd
  37. ↑ Baidu Yun official website. Retrieved 2014-04-23.(Chinese)
  38. ↑ Baidu Japan Inc.
  39. ↑ "China's Google in Japan". Infoniac.com. March 23, 2007.
  40. ↑ "After 8 years of failing, Baidu shuts Japan search engine". Tech IN Asia. April 17, 2015.
  41. ↑ "Google's Lookalike is Expanding in China". Gadget4boys.com. January 23, 2007.
  42. ↑ Baidu
  43. ↑ xiangcun.baidu.com
  44. ↑ Baidu will compile the rural digital Encyclopedia
  45. ↑ Baidu-Hexun Finance
  46. ↑ Lawton, Tait. "A Thorough Guide to Baidu Analytics (Baidu Tongji)".
  47. ↑ Youa.com
  48. ↑ Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific
  49. ↑ Baidu keyword research tool.
  50. ↑ "百度浏览器". Liulanqi.baidu.com. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  51. ↑ China's Baidu Joins Browser Battle, Wall Street Journal, July 20, 2011
  52. ↑ Baidu’s New Browser Looks Strikingly Familiar, China Real Time Report – WSJ, July 19, 2011
  53. ↑ "Baidu Looks To Leapfrog Google With Cloud-Based Mobile OS (Update)". TechCrunch. September 2, 2011. Retrieved September 7, 2011.
  54. ↑ "百度文库_百度百科". Baike.baidu.com. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  55. ↑ "百度经验_百度百科". Baike.baidu.com. 2011-06-22. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  56. ↑ "百度身边_百度百科". Baike.baidu.com. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  57. ↑ Fox Hu and Belinda Cao. Published Nov 2, 2013. Baidu’s Qunar Rises After $167 Million IPO Exceeds Target. Bloomberg L.P.. Retrieved September 25, 2014
  58. ↑ Qunar Cayman Islands Ltd Bloomberg L.P.. Retrieved September 25, 2014
  59. ↑ Lawton, Tait. "Baidu Pay Per Click: 7 Tips for a Successful Campaign". SearchEngineJournal.com.
  60. ↑ "Glogou Launches New Tools To Help Businesses Build Their Online Presence (And Ad Campaigns) In China". TechCrunch. 2012-11-06. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  61. ↑ 作者：清辰 (2012-11-07). "不懂中文没关系 Glogou帮助外企进军中国_互联网_科技时代_新浪网". Tech.sina.com.cn. Retrieved 2013-04-22.
  62. ↑ "How to manage a PPC campaign on Baidu", presentation on Slide Share http://fr.slideshare.net/Open_Link/manage-baidu-ppc-registration?from=ss_embed
  63. ↑ union.baidu.com
  64. ↑ Lin, Susan. "Baidu's Content Network - Baidu Union". NanjingMarketingGroup.com. NanjingMarketingGroup.com.
  65. ↑ Statistics on Baidu's Annual Revenue, Baidu. March 2013.
  66. ↑ Barboza, David (January 13, 2010). "Baidu's Gain from Departure Could Be China’s Loss". The New York Times.
  67. ↑ Lawton, Tait. "Pretty Graphs on Chinese Internet User Demographics, January, 2012".
  68. ↑ Fletcher, Owen (August 3, 2010). "Baidu's CEO Pursues Long-Term Growth". Wall Street Journal.
  69. ↑ 传百度与Facebook签合作协议 – Baidu signed a cooperation agreement with Facebook, ThinkingChinese, April 14, 2011
  70. ↑ [renren.com Renren
  71. ↑ [kaixin001.com Kaixin001]
  72. ↑ Baidu and QQ aren't willing to remain outside the Chinese Social Network market, ThinkingChinese, April 2011
  73. ↑ Yang, Yang (杨阳 Yáng Yáng). Translated by Guo Wei. "China's "Wikipedia" Submits Complaint about Baidu ." (Archive) Economic Observer. March 4, 2011. Issue 508, Corporation, Page 28. Retrieved on October 26, 2012. Original article: "百度：我是大哥 我不叫度娘." February 25, 2011. (Archive)
  74. ↑ Searching engines in China
  75. ↑ China Search Engine Market Share - August 2014
  76. ↑ Hsu, Alex (15 July 2013). "Baidu Using Deep-Learning Technology to Boost Phoenix Nest Revenue". BrightWire News.
  77. ↑
  78. ↑ "Baidu Applies for DNA Copyright Recognition Technology Patent". BrightWire.
  79. ↑ Baidu’s Internal Monitoring and Censorship Document Leaked (1), Xiao Qiang, China Digital Times, April 30, 2009
    Baidu’s Internal Monitoring and Censorship Document Leaked (2)
    Baidu’s Internal Monitoring and Censorship Document Leaked (3)
  80. ↑ Jonathan Stempel, "China, Baidu Sued In U.S. For Internet Censorship", Reuters, May 19, 2011.
  81. ↑ http://www.scribd.com/doc/214981183/Zhang-et-al-v-Baidu-Com-Inc-et-al
  82. ↑ http://www.itworld.com/legal/411926/us-judge-rules-baidus-censorship-protected-free-speech

Further reading

External links