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What you need to know
- Samsung stops dropping Google as default search engine on mobile devices.
- Samsung is concerned about how the market would handle the shift and its relationship with Google.
- The Korean OEM is eager to find ways to “diversify” its phone software and find ways to reduce its reliance on Google’s software.
Google can probably breathe a sigh of relief as it looks like the company won’t lose a major partner in the mobile phone industry.
Samsung is no longer considering dropping Google as the default search engine on mobile devices in favor of Microsoft’s Bing, according to the Wall Street Journal. Currently, all of Samsung’s phones, such as the Galaxy S23 Ultra, come preinstalled with the Korean company’s own browser, as well as Google Chrome. It also uses Google as its default search engine.
The WSJ states that Samsung has decided to stop discussing the possibility of a switch internally due to unnoticed concerns about how the market would react. Similarly, Samsung was also unsure about how the move would affect its relationship with Google going forward.
In particular, this idea of ensuring that Google remains the go-to search engine for phones was what prompted the 2020 US Department of Justice antitrust investigation. paid billion dollars to ensure it remains iOS’s primary search engine choice. It is estimated that Google’s payment to Samsung is significant, but not as much as Apple’s.
However, Samsung hasn’t completely closed the curtain on the possibility of Google dropping in the future. The WSJ states that Samsung’s smartphone division is still concerned about its “heavy dependence” on Google’s software. The company is still interested in “diversifying” its phone software and considering “new offerings”.
At the time Samsung’s internal discussions began, Google seemed to be hurriedly moving forward with its search AI efforts. With the threat of Bing’s ChatGPT power looming, Google quickly created a new team with the goal of bringing some AI features to Search to give users a more personalized experience. And since Google I/O 2023, we now know what some of those new experiences and features will look like.
Samsung ran into a problem with Microsoft Bing and its ChatGPT software weeks ago when a technician accidentally sent sensitive company source code to the AI chatbot. This prompted Samsung to send a memo to all employees warning them of the new ban on generative AI tools such as ChatGPT and Google’s Bard on company devices – including personal devices if they contain sensitive documents.
