Baidu

For the Ilkhanate ruler, see Baydu.

Baidu
百度

Baidu Logo
Type	Public (NASDAQ: BIDU)
Founded	Beijing, China (2000 (2000))
Headquarters	Template:Country data CHNBeijing, China
Area served	China, Japan
Key people	Robin Li (Chairman, CEO) Jennifer Li (CFO) Peng Ye (COO)
Industry	Internet search
Services	Internet search services
Revenue	¥1.74 billion (2007) (about $228 million) ▲
Operating income	¥547.15 million (2007) ▲
Profit	¥628.97 million (2007) ▲
Employees	6,252
Subsidiaries	Baidu, Inc. (Japan)
Website	Baidu.com
Alexa rank	8
Type of site	Search Engine
Advertising	PPC
Registration	Optional
Available in	Chinese Japanese www.baidu.jp
Launched	October 11, 1999
Current status	Active
Screenshot File:Baidu-Screenshot.JPG Baidu.com screenshot taken in 2007

Baidu, Inc. (Baidu) (Chinese: 百度; pinyin: Bǎidù) (NASDAQ: BIDU), incorporated on January 18, 2000, is a Chinese 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. In January 2010, Baidu ranked 8^th overall in Alexa's internet rankings. In December 2007 Baidu became the first Chinese company to be included in the NASDAQ-100 index.

Baidu provides an index of over 740 million web pages, 80 million images, and 10 million multimedia files. Baidu offers multi-media content including MP3 music and movies, and is the first in China to offer WAP and PDA-based mobile search.

Baidu proactively censors its content in line with government regulations. The Chinese government censors search results.

Name

“	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 compared 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.' (Chinese: 众里寻他千百度，蓦然回首，那人却在灯火阑珊处;) Baidu, whose literal meaning is hundreds of times, represents persistent search for the ideal.	”
—Robin Li

Services

File:Baidu-July-2008.png

A screen shot of Baidu.

Baidu offers a number of services 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.

• Baidu Map (map.baidu.com)
• Baidu started its Japanese search service (www.baidu.jp), run by Baidu Japan, the company's first regular service outside of China. It includes a search bar for web pages and image searches, user help and advanced services.
• Baidu Post Bar provides users with a query-based searchable community to exchange views and share knowledge and experiences. It is an online community bound tightly with Baidu's search service.
• Baidu News provides links to a selection of local, national and international news, and presents news stories in a searchable format, within minutes of their publication on the Web. Baidu News uses an automated process to display links to related headlines, which enables people to see many different viewpoints on the same story. Chinese government and Chinese industry sources stated that Baidu received a license from Beijing, which allows the search engine to become a full-fledged news website. Thus Baidu will be able to provide its own reports, besides showing certain results as a search engine. The company is already getting its news department ready. Baidu is the first Chinese search engine to receive such a license.
• Baidu Knows (百度知道) provides users with a query-based searchable community to share knowledge and experience. Through Baidu Knows, registered members of Baidu Knows can post specific questions for other members to respond and also answer questions of other members.
• Baidu MP3 Search provides algorithm-generated links to songs and other multimedia files provided by Internet content providers. Baidu started with a popular music search feature called "MP3 Search" and its comprehensive lists of popular Chinese music (Baidu 500) based on download numbers. Baidu locates file formats such as MP3, WMA and SWF. The multimedia search feature is mainly used in searches for Chinese pop music. While such works are copyrighted under Chinese law, Baidu claims on its legal disclaimer that linking to these files does not break Chinese law. This has led other local search engines to follow the practice, including Google China, which uses an intermediate company called Top100 to offer a similar MP3 Search service.
• Baidu Image Search enables users to search millions of images on the Internet. Baidu Image Search offers features such as search by image size and by image file type. Image listings are organized by various categories, which are updated automatically through algorithms.
• Baidu Video Search enables users to search for and access through hyperlinks of online video clips that are hosted on third parties’ Websites.
• Baidu Space (hi.baidu.com), the social networking service of Baidu, allows registered users to create personalized homepages in a query-based searchable community. Registered users can post their Web logs, or blogs, photo album and certain personal information on their homepages and establish their own communities of friends who are also registered users. By July 2009, it had reached 100 million registered users
• Baidu Encyclopedia, is China's largest encyclopedia by users and page views/web traffic; second largest encyclopedia by article count (after Hudong).
  • China Digital Village Encyclopedia (中国数字乡村大百科全书), in June 2009, Baidu announced it would compile the largest digital rural encyclopedia in China, according to China Securities Journal. It is expected to include 500,000 administrative villages in China, covering 80% of the total 600,000 villages in China. Baidu is creating the content of this encyclopedia largely from participants of its 'rural information competition' (乡村信息化大赛) (xiangcun.baidu.com), on which it has spent roughly five million yuan on incentives. Baidu sees China's rural areas as great potential for electronic business (e-business), evidenced by the fact that revenue grew the fastest from agriculture, forestry, animals and fishery in the company's keyword promotion project, a crucial source of Baidu's total revenue. In addition to Baidu Encyclopedia, the company will scale up keyword promotion and take advantage of other products, such as Baidu Zhidao and Baidu Youa, to provide consultation, brand ad exhibitions and online network marketing/sales platform support, marketing information for rural tourism and the promotion of local products.

• Baidu Search Ranking provides listings of search terms based on daily search queries entered on Baidu.com. The listings are organized by categories and allow users to locate search terms on topics of interest.
• Baidu Web Directory enables users to browse and search through websites that have been organized into categories.
• Baidu Government Information Search allows users to search various regulations, rules, notices and other information announced by People's Republic of China government entities.
• Baidu Postal Code Search enables users to search postal codes in hundreds of cities in China.
• Educational Website Search allows users to search the Websites of educational institutions. Baidu University Search allows users to search information on or browse through the Websites of specific universities in China
• Baidu Legal Search enables users to search a database that contains national and local laws and regulations, cases, legal decisions, and law dictionaries.
• Baidu Love is a query-based searchable community where registered users can write and post messages to loved ones.
• Baidu Patent Search enables users to search for specific Chinese patents and provides basic patent information in the search results, including the patent’s name, application number, filing date, issue date, inventor information and brief description of the patent.
• Baidu Games is an online channel that allows users to search or browse through game-related news and content.
• Baidu-Hexun Finance (finance.baidu.com), a financial information Website,in collaboration with Hexun.com, a financial information service provider in China with news reporting and securities consulting licenses. Users can search or browse through economic and financial news, information relating to personal wealth management and related market statistics.
• Baidu Statistics Search enables users to search statistics that have been published by the Government of the People's Republic of China
• Baidu Entertainment is an online channel for entertainment-related news and content. Users can search or browse through news and other information relating to specific stars, movies, television series and music.
• Baidu Dictionary provides users with lookup and text translation services between Chinese and English.
• Baidu Youa (youa.baidu.com), an online shopping/e-commerce platform through which businesses can sell their products and services at Baidu-registered stores.
• Baidu Desktop Search, a free, downloadable software, which enables users to search all files saved on their computer without launching a Web browser.
• Baidu Sobar, a free, downloadable software, displayed on a browser's tool bar and makes the search function available on every Web page that a user browses.
• Baidu Anti-Virus offers anti-virus software products and computer virus-related news.
• Baidu Safety Center, launched in 2008, provides users with free virus scanning, system repair and online security evaluations
• Baidu Internet TV (known as Baidu Movies) allows users to search, watch and download free movies, television series, cartoons, and other programs hosted on its servers
• Chinese-language voice assistant search services for Chinese speakers visiting Japan was launched in 2008 in collaboration with Japanese personal handy-phone system operator Willcom Inc.
• discovery.baidu.com, joint venture with Discovery Communications, focusing on science, technology, space, natural history, engineering, paleontology, archaeology, history and culture.

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 click-through 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 click throughs, 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's brand advertising feature can help the advertisers to show a branded message including images to increase brand awareness and click-through rates (up to 75%).

Baidu Union

Baidu Union (union.baidu.com) consists of a number of third-party websites and software applications. Baidu 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.

Competition

Baidu competes with Google China, Yahoo! China, Microsoft's Bing and MSN Messenger, Sina, Sohu's Sogou, Wikipedia, NetEase's Youdao, Tencent's Soso.com and PaiPai, Alibaba’s Taobao, TOM Online, Xunlei's Gougou 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. The number of Internet users in China rose to 338 million by the end of June 2009, according to a report by the China Internet Network Information Center.

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.

Domain name hacked

On 12 January 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 actual site unusable for four hours. Internet users were met with a page saying "This site has been attacked by Iranian Cyber Army". Chinese hackers later responded by attacking Iranian websites and leaving messages. Baidu recently sued Register.com for gross negligence on its domain name, which resulted in the Domain hijacking by Iranian Cyber Army.

See also

• Software industry in China
• China Software Industry Association
• Intellectual property in the People's Republic of China

External links

• (Chinese) Official website
• Baidu.com (BIDU) (Wikinvest)