Alibaba.com Begins Testing Search Engine
Sootoo.com, 10/14/10
Chinese internet users report that Hangzhou-based e-commerce company Alibaba.com (1688.HK) has launched its "1688" search engine. When contacted for comment, Alibaba said that 1688 was still undergoing internal testing.
The netizens who broke the news provided links showing that the search engine offers search in the categories of "Products," "Companies," "News," and "Business."
Editor's Note: While Alibaba already offers an on-deck search feature, it is designed mainly for English-speaking, overseas users to search information about Chinese suppliers. The new 1688 search engine, in contrast, is reportedly designed to help Chinese-speaking, Mainland China-based users search Alibaba platform content. The search engine can be found at the following address: http://search.china.alibaba.com/combo/index.htm. 1688.com is an alternate domain name for Alibaba.com. Alibaba.com told Tencent Tech that the search engine began testing in early September, and is being fine-tuned to Alibaba.com users' search habits in order to better enable them to find business opportunities. Alibaba did not disclose when 1688 Search will officially launch. 1688 Search, like Taobao's newly launched Etao search service, also reportedly uses Microsoft technology. For more background on this topic, please see "Taobao Launches Beta Version of Search Engine" MD 10/09/10 issue.
Keywords: e-commerce Internet Alibaba.com 1688.HK B2B online search Microsoft
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