Acquisitions are not generally Opera’s style. The Norwegian browser company has done only around five in its 15 years of existence. However, two of those were this year, first the $23m acquisition of AdMarvel, the mobile advertising company, in January and on Friday the purchase of FastMail, the Australian web-based email company for an undisclosed sum.
The modest spending spree represents an attempt by Opera to secure its position at an important technology transistion moment. It has always been a stalwart runner up in terms of desktop browsers, well-liked by a tech-savvy elite, but far behind the likes of Internet Explorer and Firefox in terms of user volumes. However, there is a chance for it to secure leadership in mobile browsing.
Opera is currently the leader in the nascent mobile phone browser market, according to Statcounter, with nearly 26 per cent share, compared to 21 per cent for Apple’s Safari browser on the iPhone. Opera recently reported it had more than 50m users its Opera Mini browser for mobile phones. Opera Mini is now even downloadable onto the iPhone, for those who want an alternative to Safari.
However, as more and more internet-enabled mobile devices come onto the market, the competition is going to get much more fierce, and Opera could risk being sidelined again, as it was on the desktop. Nokia, BlackBerry and Palm all have their own browsers, and as more phones using Google’s Android operating system come onto the market, Opera could find itself increasingly squeezed.
Jon von Tetzchner, chief executive of Opera, said FastMail would enhance the user experience of the Opera browser by allowing people to have a better webmail experience with it. Opera is thinking particularly of emerging markets like India and Africa, where for many people the mobile phone will be the first gateway to the web, and their first experience of web-based email. These users aren’t already hooked into Gmail or Hotmail accounts, and are there to be grabbed by the best integrated mobile browser and email combination. At the same time, the AdMarvel business should help them find ways to monetise this audience better through advertising.
Mr van Tetzchner’s instincts seem good, but it remains to be seen if these moves will be enough to combat the firepower of rivals like Apple, Google and HP, which just spent $1.2bn buying Palm, and will invest heavily in developing Palm’s software. Perhaps an alliance with Nokia – whose stronghold is in emerging markets after all - might be the better move to ensure it does not get left out in the cold.
