Tag Archive for: Firefox Quantum

Yahoo Sues Mozilla for Replacement of Firefox’s Default Search to Google

It was announced earlier this week that Yahoo’s parent company (Oath) has decided to sue Mozilla for “breach of contract.” Oath claims that Mozilla “terminated a long term strategic agreement with Yahoo” in November. Mozilla recently launched their upgraded Firefox Quantum browser and has implemented Google as their new default search tool. It was approximately 3 years ago when Yahoo and Mozilla signed an agreement that Yahoo would be the default search engine on Firefox.

According to Greg Sterling in an article from Search Engine Land, the lawsuit “seeks unspecified money damages and interest from Mozilla, but Mozilla claims they have the right to terminate the relationship under the contract.” Mozilla’s Firefox browser lost market share to Chrome during the 3 year period with Yahoo. Mozilla blames this lose in market share largely on Yahoo search. Yahoo/Oath argue that “issues with the browser experience (speed and performance)” were to blame instead. Sterling points out that “the truth probably lies somewhere in between.”

Implications Moving Forward
Mozilla switching from Yahoo to Google as their new default search tool is huge. As if Google’s market share in search engine providers wasn’t large enough, this move will expand their share even more. The article states that “Firefox’s market share is about 13 percent to Chrome’s nearly 59 percent. Yahoo search market share is roughly 12 percent to Google’s 63 percent.” Ultimately, it will be interesting to see where Firefox’s market share goes from here, as the reactions to the upgraded “Firefox Quantum” browser appear to be positive thus far.

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