Friday, November 20, 2009

Yahoo To Shut down ‘Yahoo Go’ – Shifts Focus Entirely On Mobile Web

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The news of discountinuing services from Yahoo’s fold is no surprise as the company gears up to cut its cost and drive all its energy in its core segment i.e. Portal. This time Yahoo has decided to pull the plug from ‘Yahoo Go’ its mobile application.
Yahoo has notified its users that ‘Yahoo Go’ will be discontinued from Jan,2010. This was pretty much expected as Yahoo has not upgraded the application since more than a year. Yahoo has also doubled its resources on mobile web division as it feels that the improved browsing experience will allow it to capture mobile web market through its mobile portal.

Current active users on ‘Yahoo Go’ can start using the service on m.yahoo.com after Jan-2010.
‘Yahoo Go’ had tie-up with many handset manufacturers like Nokia, HTC to pre-install the app on their phones. The service which was launched in 2006 provided news, mail and weather updates on Mobile. Yahoo’s current mobile site allows all the similar feature along with additional features like IM, integration with social networks.

It might seem that Yahoo decision to shun its application comes on the heels of its decision to surrender its search services to Microsoft. Yahoo might deem it as a good cost cutting exercise but it is certainly not in company’s best interest to pull-out its mobile application completely at a time when Google is focusing its resources on Mobile market through android and various other apps. Instead it should have made the application more compatible to today’s browsing needs.

Mobile web market is turning into a hot trajectory as app revolution added with rich mobile browsing experience is seeing a surge in Mobile web adoption. The increase in mobile web usages has already seen Google making big ticket acquisition in mobile monetization space.