Yahoo Wins T-Mobile “Default Search” Business

Yahoo’s oneSearch will be the “default” search engine on T-Mobile’s new Web2Go portal. Yahoo has such a relationship with T-Mobile in Europe already. In the US, Yahoo also provides mobile search to AT&T. Verizon and Google are battling for similar “default” status on Verizon handsets. Both Google and Microsoft have a relationship with Sprint.

This brings to more than 80 the carrier relationships that Yahoo has cultivated around the world. It means that Yahoo has the capacity to reach approxiately 850 million people through those deals.

In the US mobile search market share looks similar to what it is on the desktop, with Yahoo (depending on the source) enjoying a somewhat higher share than it has online. However, comScore reported that for September the “carrier’s search engine” had a greater market share than Microsoft Live or AOL search in mobile. That finding may indicate there’s a meaningful marketshare bump to be had from these “default” mobile search deals.

I have some additional discussion and information at LocalMobileSearch.net.