Baidu will preinstall its services, including text, image, MP3 and news search, in China Unicom’s 3G mobile phones, according to the agreement. It will also provide search services for mobile Internet websites run by the carrier, which plans to launch the iPhone in China this month.

But a China Unicom spokesman said the deal with Baidu was not exclusive. He said Google’s services preinstalled in the iPhone would not be impacted by the partnership.

In 2007, Google announced a partnership with China Mobile to provide mobile search for the country’s largest cell phone carrier. It also said last week that it plans to launch Chinese-language voice search service to Chinese smart-phone users in the next several weeks.

According to figures from research firm Analysys International, in China’s mobile search market, Google’s share reached 26.6 percent in the second quarter of this year, higher than the 26 percent that Baidu clinched.

Source : Konaxis