
The question now is whether Coc Coc can generate sustained revenue growth and profitability. With smartphone sales up 25% to 3 million handsets in the first quarter and Vietnamese operators offering some of the cheapest mobile data rates in the world, a push into mobile could see Coc Coc significantly boost its user base.
Coccoc vietnam software#
To tap Vietnam's 23 million smartphone users, Coc Coc is developing a mobile browser to challenge those offered by Norway's Opera Software and Google, which currently lead the local market. This includes a built-in Vietnamese-to-English dictionary that helps users surf English-language sites, and a language tool that automatically adds lingual tones to Vietnamese words with a claimed 90% accuracy rate. The Coc Coc browser's biggest draw has been its functionality. In July, its search engine attracted around 51 million visits, up from 34 million in February, while Google saw a drop in the number of Vietnam-based users from 334 million hits to approximately 221 million, according to SimilarWeb. While founders Thanh and Binh are still with the company, Ngoc has left but remains a shareholder.Ĭoc Coc appears to be gaining ground on Google. In contrast, Coc Coc's management and its 300 Web developers and engineers are all based in Hanoi. The U.S company's only local representation so far is an office for its advertising arm, AdSense. "Google isn't going to give you information about a local banh mi or pho stand," said Lavrenko, referring to famous local street food dishes. The objective is to pre-emptively strike at Google before it establishes an in-country presence. Lavrenko puts the company's success in attracting users down to features such as an algorithm that delivers a wealth of locally based Vietnamese-language search results. "It is better for searching or writing emails in Vietnamese."


"I can find a lot more local content in Vietnamese, such as where I might find the nearest bike shop or Vietnamese literature, on Coc Coc," said Thuy Hang, an international studies student at Hanoi University. SimilarWeb, another analytics company, ranks Coc Coc's search engine as the second-most used in the country, after Google. The desktop Web browser from Coc Coc, which means "knock knock" in Vietnamese, has in two years surpassed the offerings from Microsoft and Mozilla to become the second-most widely used in Vietnam, after Chrome, according to U.S.-based Internet analytics company comScore. Lavrenko, now Coc Coc's chief executive, was able to put together a reported $100 million from Russian investors willing to bet the new venture could replicate the success of the country's Yandex search engine in besting Google on home ground. The three enlisted Victor Lavrenko, a veteran of Russia's Internet startup scene, as a partner and investor to develop a search engine and Web browser specifically tailored for the Vietnamese market.
