Vietnamese search engine Coc Coc raises $14m

[bill]

http://www.dealstreetasia.com/stories/coc-coc-receives-14m-hubert-burda-media-2746/ [dealstreetasia.com]

Vietnamese search engine Coc Coc raises $14m from Germany's Hubert Burda

According to the company, the number subscribers using Coc Coc Search has touched the 23 million mark. This translates into a third of Vietnam’s internet users.

In addition to the search engine tool, the company plans to develop apps for mobile devices and expand to other markets in the region, including Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia.

Apparently Google doesn't get the nuances of the Vietnamese language, and Coc Coc, a Russian-Vietnamese start-up, has been growing in popularity as a result. This investment will help them spread their platforms in Asia.

[engine]

It's nice to see some of the smaller and more targeted search engines doing well in their own markets.

[lucy24]

<tangent>
Anyone know what "coc coc" means? Google Translate insists it means "cup", which seems improbable unless there's some cultural association I'm not seeing. (They also politely suggest that each "o" has both an acute and a circumflex over it-- but it still comes through with the same meaning. Fascinatingly, they claim that a single "coc", with or without diacritics, means "glass").
</tangent>

[LifeinAsia]

The numbers don't grok...

the number subscribers using Coc Coc Search has touched the 23 million mark. This translates into a third of Vietnam’s internet users.

later

Coc Coc’s daily traffic is 8 million people, accounting for 25 per cent of Vietnam’s Internet users.

The first quote suggests 69 million Internet users, while the 2nd suggests only 32 million- that's a big discrepancy. (From other sources, I've seen stats for Vietnam's Internet users showing around 40 million.) None of the bean counters at Hubert Burda bothered to check these numbers before writing a check for $14m?

[bill]

Anyone know what "coc coc" means?

It's supposedly the onomatopoeia for the English equivalent of "Knock Knock"

The numbers don't grok...

Good catch. I wonder if they're mixing up PC and mobile numbers.