Google’s Search Share in China Continues to Drop (GOOG, BIDU, SOHU)

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) continues to lose share in the Chinese search market. In the fourth quarter of 2011, Google claimed just 16.7% of search revenue, compared with the 78.3% share claimed by China’s homegrown search engine Baidu Inc. (NASDAQ: BIDU). The third-largest share of revenue went to Sohu.com Inc. (NASDAQ: SOHU), which claimed 2.7% of search revenues.

Baidu’s share grew by 0.1% sequentially, while Google’s share fell by -0.5%. Sohu’s share increased by 0.5% sequentially.

Google’s declining  share of the search market can be traced back to the company’s decision to move its servers to Hong Kong following a disagreement with the mainland government. Before the move, Google claimed about 36% of China’s search revenue.