The head of Google in China has resigned in a move that will raise new questions about whether the US search company can succeed in the world’s biggest internet market.
Google announced today that Kai-Fu Lee, the president of Google China and vice president of engineering, will leave the company this month to set up his own venture.
Mr Lee said: “With a very strong leadership team in place, it seemed a very good moment for me to move to the next chapter in my career.”
Google has struggled to overtake Baidu, China’s dominant internet search company, since it launched in the country which has an online population of 298 million
In the second quarter, Baidu controlled 61.6 per cent of China’s search market compared with its rival’s 29 per cent, according to Analysys International.
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At the same time, Google China has been battling with authorities who want the company to censor its searches and eliminate pornography from its Chinese web results.
Google was blocked for two hours on June 24 and has experienced several disruptions.
China said it will crack down on internet content it deems unhealthy, which has included pornography and information critical of authorities — a censorship system dubbed the “Great Firewall of China”.
Google poached Mr Lee from Microsoft in 2005 in a move that provoked months of acrimony between the two technology companies.
Mr Lee was in charge of the software company’s Beijing research and development centre. Microsoft sued Google and Mr Lee to prevent him from passing on trade secrets to Google.
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Google countersued, accusing Microsoft of “a shocking display of hubris”, according to court documents. The companies settled privately in 2005.
A former assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, one of the leading US computer science institutions, Mr Lee worked in the field of interactive media software at Apple and Silicon Graphics before opening Microsoft’s Beijing R&D centre in 1998.
Google said today that John Liu will take over Mr Lee’s business and operational responsibilities while Yeo Boon-Lock will oversee Mr Lee’s engineering role.