Analyst Says Google Chrome Is Coming to iOS

Jay Yarow, regarding a report by analyst Ben Schacter claiming that a version of Chrome for iOS is imminent:

Google is currently paying Apple an estimated 50%-60% revenueshare for searches done through the Safari search box, saysSchacter. So, if there is $1 billion in gross search revenue fromiPads, iPhones, and iPod Touches, Apple gets $600 million, Googleonly gets $400 million. By cutting out Safari, and owning all thesearches, Google gets to keep all of the revenue it generates.

I wonder if this is true. I know that Apple gets money from Google for searches conducted through Safari’s search field, but is it feasible for it to be a revenue share? How would Apple verify the prices paid by the advertisers?

The catch for Google is that Apple doesn’t allow third-partyapplications like Chrome to act as defaults. So, if you click on alink in an email it will take you mobile Safari by default insteadof Chrome.

The other catch is that the App Store rules don’t allow third-party software runtimes. Yes, Chrome for the desktop is based on WebKit, but it’s Google’s own fork of WebKit, and Google’s own JavaScript engine. Chrome for iOS would have to use iOS’s system standard WebKit, and the slower non-Nitro JavaScript engine.

However, as Schacter says, this could be the second wave ofbrowser wars. Microsoft was hammered in the late nineties by thegovernment for making IE the default browser on Windows, and thusmarginalizing the then dominant Netscape browser. If Apple isgoing to follow the same playbook, the government too might followthe same playbook and come after Apple. And don’t forget, Googlehas been active in D.C. making friends, while Apple has haslargely given D.C. a cold shoulder.

There are good security reasons for Apple’s ban on third-party runtimes and disallowing marking memory as executable (which is why App Store apps don’t get the Nitro JavaScript engine). But I can’t think of a good reason why iOS users can’t specify third-party apps to be their default web browser (or email client, or calendar).

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