Despite Apple adding Bing and Yahoo as search engine options in iOS, Google remains the default Safari search engine. It turns out Google pays a sweet sum to keep it that way.
Google pays a hefty $1 billion for the right to receive all of the glorious search queries logged by iDevice users. While that seems like a massive amount for a rather invisible honor, the pay out for Google is rather large. According to Macquarie analyst Ben Schachter Google sees revenues of nearly $1.3 billion because of their default search status.
Google’s $1 billion investment might seem steep, but the $300 million in profit is accompanied by the massive amount of data collected on millions of iDevice users. This treasure trove of information is likely invaluable compared to the advertising profits in Google’s eyes.
Don’t expect Bing or Yahoo to pony up the kind of cash necessary to supplant Google as the default Safari search engine any time soon. But, be aware Google views every iDevice user and their information as cog in their business plan. It'd be interesting know how the Google Search and Apple relationship has changed over the life of the iPhone and iOS. Apple appears to have the upper-hand now as they could drop default support for Google search and not miss a step. However, at the iPhone's inception Google search and Google Maps integration were touted features. How times change.
Source: Business Insider [via iDownloadBlog]
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