Update: Sina Microblog Partners with Social Search Engine Yunyun
Tencent Tech, 12/18/12
Chinese social search engine Yunyun.com officially launched today, offering social web, real-time, image, and mobile app search. Yunyun founder Liu Jun confirmed rumors that Yunyun would partner with Chinese internet company Sina's (Nasdaq: SINA) Weibo microblog platform, saying that Sina had invested in Yunyun right after the company was founded, and had continued to invest in its development.
Sina's partnership with Yunyun began half a year ago, under the leadership of Wang Gaofei, GM of Sina's wireless division. Unlike the previous version of mobile Weibo search, which allowed users to search only for other users or Weibo updates, the new version of mobile Weibo search released by Yunyun and Sina is a general search function allowing users to search for other Weibo users, microblog updates, news stories, images, webpages, and even non-Sina content.
Liu said that Sina Weibo currently only uses Yunyun's search technology for its mobile client, while PC clients still use Sina's own search technology. He added that Yunyun hopes to partner with Tencent (0700.HK) Microblog and other microblog platforms for its technology, rather than working solely with Sina.
More than two years after Yunyun was founded, Liu said, the company has not incurred large losses. Yunyun has profited from the sale of search technology to the People's Daily-operated search platform Jike and to the National Library of China. Once the National Library search project is completed, Liu said, Yunyun will be profitable.
Two former Google employees at the company - Wang Dong and Chen Liren - left Yunyun on the eve of the site's official launch. Chen Liren joined rival Chinese search engine Panguso as CTO. Liu said that more than ten former Google employees remain at Yunyun.
Editor's Note: Yunyun is a comprehensive search engine that prioritizes query results based in part on what content is being posted on Sina Weibo by the user's social connections or how many "likes" a given piece of content indexed by Yunyun has been given by the user's Weibo social contacts. Yunyun's search engine also offers other social functions, such as the option to "like" or repost any given search result. For more information on this topic, please see "Rumor: Yunyun to Power Sina Microblog Search Service," MD 11/30/12 issue.
Keywords: Chen Liren Liu Jun Wang Dong Wang Gaofei Internet Yunyun microblogging online search
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