Burnt out: how MozillaFirefox can keepthe lights on

Mozilla has dropped its Google funding and shut down two revenue targeting projects. Is the end nigh for the developer?

FILLING A $300 MILLION hole in a budget isn’t easy for any company, but Mozilla is so serious about not taking Google’s money for search referrals that it’s refusing payment even when it could be charging.

Last year, Mozilla cited competition reasons for why it would no longer take Google’s money for search referrals – which was once responsible for 90% (or £300 million) of Mozilla’s income. The open-source company said it’s since made up some of that funding thanks to search deals with Yahoo in the US, Baidu in China and Yandex in Russia. It’s yet to find a deal in Europe, where Google remains the default search engine – a benefit it currently receives for free.

Publicly, Mozilla claims it isn’t worried, with chief financial officer Jim Cook saying in a statement that the developer’s situation is “really strong”. However, the funding shift comes alongside other challenges, including announcements that Mozilla is shutting down Firefox OS, its mobile operating system, and Sponsored Tiles, ads embedded in the homescreen of the browser.

Beginning of the end?

Over the past seven years, Firefox’s global share on desktop has slid from 26% to 15%, according to StatCounter, while Google’s Chrome browser has climbed from nothing to 54%. “In many ways, it’s natural to see Mozilla and Google drifting apart,” Greg Taylor, research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, told PC Pro. “Their original deal was struck at a time when Firefox was the rising star of the web-browser market and virtually all browsing was done on the desktop. Now, Google controls the world’s most popular browser and the world’s most popular mobile operating system, which itself supports a growing share of browsing activity.” The failure of Firefox OS could be as much a problem as the desktop decline, said analyst Jeff Kagan. “I think this Firefox OS problem may be the beginning of the end for Mozilla,” he said. “While this was a good idea, it apparently isn’t winning enough market share to make the effort worthwhile

Firefox, we need you

Taylor disagrees, saying Firefox brings benefits even for those who don’t browse with it. “I think that Mozilla and Firefox have a valuable role to play in the vitality of the broader web ecosystem, so it would be a real shame to lose them,” he said. “Of the other three major browsers [Internet Explorer/Edge, Safari and Chrome], two are not cross-platform, and all are sponsored by platform owners who might be suspected of having ulterior motives.

“We should expect that such competition helps to keep everyone honest, and may also be a spur for innovation in the sector,” Taylor added. “Past innovations such as tabbed browsing or the unified address/search bar were rapidly imitated across the industry after their initial introduction, which suggests that having another team of engineers working on ways to improve users’ browsing experience is likely to have a positive impact on product quality across the sector

Making it pay

The search deals with Yahoo and others will help replenish Mozilla’s coffers, but with 90% of Europeans turning to Google for search, Taylor noted that “it’s not clear how happily European consumers would embrace a browser” that used a rival. Despite Mozilla no longer taking Google’s cash, its search remains the default in Firefox’s search bar across Europe.

But Taylor said there are many ways the open-source developer can fund its work without Google. Mozilla could drive traffic to a web portal or build its own search engine. “But that would be a significant undertaking, so I consider it to be quite unlikely,” Taylor added. Mozilla could also push more for donations – it’s now showing a donation message on homescreens, but it’s a far cry from the insistent plea that Wikipedia shows on every page during its annual drive – or it could start selling services to corporates.

“What exactly the best option is depends on circumstances that only Mozilla’s executives are privy to, but the bottom line is that if you control access to 15% of the world’s web traffic then you should be able to find some way to stay in business,” Taylor said.