Facebook’s Google moment – plans search and expects to make more money from mobile

12 Sep 2012

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg fielding questions at TechCrunch Disrupt yesterday

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed at the TechCrunch Disrupt Conference yesterday that in the coming years he expects to make more money from mobile users than from those using Facebook via a computer.

Zuckerberg also revealed at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco, California, that so far he believes the company’s mobile strategy has been misunderstood, albeit he admits designing apps exclusively in HTML 5 as opposed to native was a mistake.

The real elephant in the room appears to be search. Zuckerberg revealed that every day Facebook is receiving 1bn search queries so there is a tantalising opportunity to challenge Google in the search market. Perhaps in the same way Google has been endeavouring to challenge Facebook in the social networking business.

Zuckerberg told the conference that Facebook made a big bet on HTML 5 and only realised six to eight months deep into the programme that it was the wrong bet.

“Good isn’t good enough,” Zuckerberg said.

Zuckerberg also termed the bet on HTML 5 “the biggest strategic mistake we ever made.”

He also said that following the recent launch of new iOS apps, an Android update should be coming soon.

Ultimately, Zuckerberg said Facebook’s mobile strategy has been largely misunderstood. He said there’s much more engagement and users are spending more time on the apps.

“We also think we’re going to make more money on the time they spend on mobile,” he said yesterday.

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com