Global Search Engine Marketing & Social Media News And Analysis » Qais Al Khateeb

Orascom Telecom launches mobile search engine service

Qais Al Khateeb — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 09:42:36 +0000

The Egyptian’s Orascom Telecom has launched their mobile version of search engine http://www.onkosh.com with .mobi top level domain extension onkosh.mobi that compatible for mobile devices.

“We are very excited about the imminent consumer launch of onkosh.mobi, the mobile version of Orascom’s new Arabic-language search portal, onkosh.com,” said Khaled Bichara, Orascom Telecom Holding Board Member & Chief Fixed and Portal Officer, Wind Telecomunicazioni SpA.
“We will be greatly enhancing this in the coming months on an ongoing basis with data from the dotMobi mobile content database, to give our Arabic users the full mobile web experience.
Onkosh is built from the ground up with the Arabic user in mind, utilizing advanced NLP (Natural Language Processing) to improve search results.”

Orascom Telecom interested to gain share in Internet search market in Middle East because of search advertising opportunity, which there are Google, Araby.com, and Ayna competing to offer Arabic search services with different verticals. Also the mobile search market is increasing in MENA region due to high mobile penetration.

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Norway’s FAST cuts out the middleman of search advertising

Qais Al Khateeb — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 10:42:43 +0000

FAST one of the leaders in search engine technologies in the world has launched their private-label monetization platform called AdMomentum for online media publishers, retailers, and telecommunications service providers.

Publishers now can have their own network and advertisers without any third party intervention. AdMomentum will help publishers to build direct relationships with their advertisers with customized interface and advertising options like: Text, Images, Video, and audio.

“There’s no question that search technology and performance advertising have dramatically transformed the world of publishing, but for many publishers the transformation has not paid off as well as it should,” said John M. Lervik, CEO of FAST. “Publishers want to maintain control of their revenue, serving their advertisers and audiences more effectively, and this has been difficult to do with third-party platforms. With FAST AdMomentum, we give that control and independence back to publishers – enabling them for the first time to fully monetize their assets without having to share revenues or risk customer disintermediation.”

Definitely, this new product will compete with Google AdSense & Yahoo Publisher Network since there is no more revenue sharing with this new platform, the publisher can sell his own listings directly to advertisers and spread the ad through his local and/or national network.

FAST will launch this new platform in first quarter of this year; also they did beta testing with one of their clients such as: 24.com, local.com, sesam.no, and sensis.com.au.

Fast’s press release announcement

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Naseej launches mobile search engine and directory service in Saudi Arabia

Qais Al Khateeb — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 09:05:49 +0000

Naseej is one of the popular ISPs in Saudi Arabia has launched mobile search engine and directory called “Daleel Raheeb” http://www.raheeb.com for Saudi market only at least in the first phase. This new service is in Beta version, which works with two mobile operators Jawal and Mobily.

“Daleel Raheeb” aims at indexing mobile content available to users via their mobile operator and third-party content. The WAP site service designed to fit mobile interface and functionality. This service is offered in Arabic language only, since it’s the native language for Saudi people.

Abduljabbar, the president of Naseej said:

The sheer number of content and service providers tapping the mobile channel is immense; it would be near impossible for users to remember each and every premium short code or service URL, this is where Raheeb plays a vital role as a single point of access for users searching for mobile content and for content providers searching for the right vehicle to reach users; for the latter group Raheeb will prove to be much more effective than running expensive newspaper campaigns with very temporary and limited effect at best.

They are going to serve different topics for Saudi mobile users like: News, Stock market, web directory, weather, WAP sites directory, sports, Islam, and misc.

Naseej plans in next phase to widen their service coverage with new mobile operators in other countries. The number of mobile subscribers in Saudi market is 19 million subscribers which is considered the largest market in the region.

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Google participates in Cairo ICT 2007

Qais Al Khateeb — Sun, 04 Feb 2007 11:09:53 +0000

Google established their Middle Eastern branch in Egypt last year for Business Development purpose; now they are strengthening their regional existence by taking part of the most important IT events in the region at Cairo ICT Exhibition from February 4 – 7, 2007.

Sherif Eskander, Google regional manager of Middle East & North Africa said:

Google has a long-term commitment to this dynamic region, which has potential for growth and development. Last year we launched a number of custom designed products for the Arab world, and our participation in Cairo ICT only confirms our commitment

Google works seriously to develop customized services for Arab world, including Gmail, News, and Adwords. Google targeting Arabic Internet market since the Internet penetration of the region is high and its promising Internet search market.

Cairo ICT 2007 is considered as one of top IT events in MENA region which the major players in the business are participating and showing their latest technologies.

The article can be found here

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