Baidu's billionaire CEO declares he can beat Google again

[BEIJING] The billionaire founder of China's top internet search engine has declared he will fight fiercely and "win again" should Alphabet Inc's Google decide to return to the world's largest internet arena.

Baidu Inc Chief Executive Officer Robin Li, responding for the first time to reports the US search titan is plotting a return to a market it largely pulled out of in 2010, said on social media he's confident of eliminating Google if needed. Mr Li's post, to friends via his personal WeChat account, comes as Baidu's shares have slid about 6 per cent since the Intercept reported Google was designing a censored search engine to deploy in China within a year.

"If Google decides to return to China, we are very confident that we will PK once again and win again," he said, using a gaming term that's come to mean to compete against. "In 2010, when Google withdrew from China, its market share was declining and Baidu's market share had exceeded 70 per cent."

Google is looking at ways to re-enter China, home to the biggest pool of internet users, through a search app that complies with Chinese censorship as well as partnerships with local companies, people familiar with the matter have said. After withdrawing, most of its services were blocked in the country. News of a potential return have been met with resistance from employees and criticism from human rights advocates and lawmakers.

Mr Li also referenced a commentary by the People's Daily, the mouthpiece of the Communist Party, which welcomed Google's return as long as it abided by local rules and regulations on censorship. Chinese tech giants are constantly censored with posts deemed harmful to social order quickly erased from public view.

But Mr Li argued China's market had gone through "earth-shaking changes" since Google's departure, adding that Chinese technology companies were now leaders in solving new problems. "The world is copying from China," he posted. "This is something every company wanting to enter the China market must carefully consider and face."

BLOOMBERG