It's really not impossible to acquire Chrome without spending a single cent.

The story of a "snake swallowing an elephant" is not uncommon in the business world, but a "ant swallowing an elephant" can be considered a one - in - ten - thousand occurrence. Now, a non - profit search engine from Germany, Ecosia, wants to play the role of the "ant" and attempt to gobble up Google's Chrome browser.

Recently, Ecosia, a non - profit search engine well - known for using its profits for afforestation and climate protection, formally made an acquisition offer to Google. It hopes to obtain control of the Chrome browser at a price of $0 and has promised to provide Google with a 40% profit share in the future.

Of course, Ecosia's so - called "$0" doesn't mean it wants Google to give Chrome away for free. Instead, it plans to follow the model of the Linux Foundation and establish a "Chrome Foundation". Ecosia will take on the operational responsibility of the Chrome browser for the next 10 years, while Google will retain ownership and intellectual property rights. In short, Ecosia is preparing to set up a Chrome trust, with itself as the administrator and Google only receiving dividends.

It's worth mentioning that Ecosia isn't seeking personal gain. In its vision, 40% of the profits generated by Chrome will go to Google, and the remaining 60% will be used for climate and environmental projects. Ecosia won't take a single cent from this process.

Then the question arises: Although Ecosia is truly working for the future of the Earth, where does it get the courage to ask Google to hand over control of Chrome?

This is, of course, because Google is in trouble and may really be forced to lose control of Chrome. Not long ago, the AI search unicorn Perplexity also put forward a shocking "snake - swallowing - elephant" acquisition proposal. This AI startup, which has been established for only three years, made an offer to Google's parent company, Alphabet, planning to acquire the Chrome browser with a full - cash offer of $34.5 billion. This offer is even twice Perplexity's own valuation of $18 billion.

Coincidentally, Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, also expressed interest in acquiring Chrome not long ago. The reason why Chrome has become so attractive is that Google lost an antitrust lawsuit against the US Department of Justice last summer. As the winner, the US Department of Justice hopes the court will take strict remedial measures against Google, including requiring it to sell the Chrome browser to promote fair competition in the internet search field.

After a year of back - and - forth, the US court will make a ruling on the remedial measures for Google's antitrust case within August. A year ago, the judge in charge of this case ruled that Google's monopoly behavior was established. Moreover, while insisting on forcing Google to sell its Chrome browser business, the US Department of Justice no longer seeks to force the divestiture of Google's AI investments. Instead, it requires the company to submit a review application before the transaction is completed.

If Google has to choose between Chrome and AI, it will probably choose the former without hesitation. So the probability that it will sell Chrome under legal compulsion is quite high. It's precisely because Google may really lose Chrome that Ecosia, Perplexity, and even OpenAI are starting to get restless.

Why is Chrome so important? It's because it occupies more than two - thirds of the entire browser market, making Google, the owner of Chrome, effectively the administrator of the Web ecosystem. A typical example is that Google, against the opposition of the community, forcibly phased out Manifest V2 and promoted the new - generation Manifest V3.

Regarding Manifest V3, Ghostery, a well - known open - source ad blocker, said, "Through Manifest V3, Google will close the door to innovation in the ad - blocking field and introduce another layer of gatekeeping, which will slow down the response speed of ad blockers to new advertising and online tracking methods." In Manifest V3, Google proposed that to ensure the security of the browser, the webRequest API used to view or block browser requests would be replaced by the Declarative Net Request API.

This small change directly affects the vast majority of ad blockers. In fact, the webRequest API is the key for mainstream ad blockers like AdBlock and Ghostery to implement ad - filtering rules. The difference between changing from the webRequest API to the Declarative Net Request API is that the latter limits the number of rules to 30,000, while the current ad - filtering rules, including comments, total nearly 100,000.

Moreover, in Manifest V3, the update of browser extensions must go through the review process of the Chrome Web Store. That means ad - blocker developers need to wait for Google's review when changing ad - blocking rules, which is equivalent to weakening the ability of ad - blocking tools in the Chrome ecosystem, but it caters to advertisers. In fact, to some extent, Chrome has also contributed to the sharp increase in Google's advertising revenue in the past year.

In addition, the browser is an important gateway for a large number of users to access the Internet, and its status has not changed much even in the era of mobile Internet.

So, between Perplexity and Ecosia, who is more likely to succeed in acquiring Chrome? If Google has to sell Chrome, it may be more likely to sell it to Ecosia rather than Perplexity.

Because handing Chrome over to a non - profit competitor will help Google improve its corporate image. After all, Ecosia is not like OpenAI; it is truly idealistic, and the outside world often has a good impression of such a gathering place of idealists with firm beliefs. On the contrary, Perplexity is a real competitor to Google, and it is precisely the existence of Perplexity that has forced Google to reconstruct its search engine with AI.

If Perplexity really "acquires" Chrome, it can be described as getting an even greater boost. So Ecosia's offer to acquire Chrome for $0 is not a wild fantasy. Once the court makes a ruling unfavorable to Google, there's a chance that Ecosia will really "get Chrome".

[The pictures in this article are from the Internet.] 

This article is from the WeChat public account "3eLife" (ID: IT - 3eLife). The author is 3e Jun. It is published by 36Kr with authorization.