With a 27.1% share of the smartphone market, Samsung is considering a switch to Microsoft’s Bing, which is equipped with ChatGPT technology.
According to a US newspaper, Samsung is exploring the possibility of changing the default search engine on its Galaxy phones to Microsoft’s Bing, which would feature Alphabet’s Google-powered AI chatbot ChatGPT.
If the world’s leading smartphone maker Apple Inc. follows suit, the potential shift from Google to Microsoft’s Bing as the default search engine on Samsung Galaxy phones could deal a significant blow to Google’s current dominance in the global search engine market.
The New York Times reported on Sunday that Google employees were taken aback in March upon learning of Samsung’s potential plan to replace Google with Microsoft’s Bing as the default search engine on its devices. Internal messages reviewed by the newspaper revealed that Google’s response to this threat was one of “panic.” The report stated that an estimated $3 billion in annual revenue is on the line with the Samsung contract, and an additional $20 billion is at risk with a similar Apple contract set to expire this year. Samsung has utilized Google as its default search engine since 2010, when the company released its first smartphone featuring the Android mobile operating system.
A potential threat to the dominance of the search engine king.
As of last month, Google controlled 93.2% of the global search engine market, according to StatCounter, leaving Microsoft’s Bing a distant second with only 2.9%. In the mobile search engine sector, Google held a dominant share of 96.6%, while Bing accounted for just 0.5%. Nonetheless, smaller players such as Microsoft are beginning to erode Google’s share with the help of AI technology.
According to a report by Reuters last month, Bing’s traffic has increased by 15.8% since Microsoft integrated ChatGPT, developed by OpenAI using generative AI technology. The report cites data from Israeli web analytics firm, SimilarWeb Ltd. Meanwhile, Google’s traffic fell by 1% during the same period.
Samsung’s potential move to Bing presents a significant threat to Google, given that the South Korean tech giant holds a 27.1% share of the global smartphone market as of March, with only Apple’s iPhone ahead at 28.4%.
The defense of Google.
Google’s attempt to attract global users with its chatbot Bard in February failed when it answered a simple query incorrectly, causing a more than 7% drop in Alphabet’s shares. The New York Times has reported that Google is currently developing a new search engine, named Magi, with AI technology, but has not yet applied Bard to its search engine.
It is anticipated that the company will unveil its new search engine in the United States next month, with plans to initially offer the service to 1 million users, and potentially expanding to up to 30 million by year-end.
