Chinese mobile app & in-app search service Wandoujia has had 31 partners adopted its API. Those partners not only include retailer Suning, and smart device makers such as Xiaomi, Meizu and ASUS, but also a couple of mobile search services, Sogou and the newly established Shenma.
Users of those smart devices or mobile search services will get search results, apps or in-app content, provided by Wandoujia or download apps directly on a search result page. ASUS, Taiwan-bases consumer electronics manufacturer, has integrated Wandoujia search in the app store pre-loaded in the smartphones it produces.
What’s interesting is Sogou and Shenma use Wandoujia API to deliver mobile search results. Shenma is the mobile search brand jointly established by Alibaba Group and mobile browser provider UCWeb. One week after its launch, UCWeb stated that Shenma had got 20% market penetration,thanks to the fact that users had gotten used to use the search box within UC mobile browser — before the launch of Shenma, the default search service on UC browser was Baidu. Apparently Shenma hasn’t developed a well-functioning mobile search.
What’s more surprising is Sogou is using a third-party service for its mobile search product, for the company has been building a web search engine since 2003. It’s now the third largest web search engine in China, after Baidu and Qihoo, with 13% a market share as of April 2014, according to Chinese online data service CNZZ. Sogou launched a search app yesterday.
Since 2011 Wandoujia has been collecting mobile apps and working on making in-app content searchable. It has indexed 1.5 million mobile apps from ten Android app stores in China. So far the searchable in-app content through Wandoujia includes video, mobile game, e-book and smartphone theme. Earlier this month the company received a huge amount of funding from big names such as Softbank and Goldman Sachs.