This list begins with a startup that dared to go up against the internet giants. Baidu, the king of Chinese search (60% market share in 2007) has features which are customized for locals. Cofounder Robin Li is convinced that Baidu will "become bigger than Google," and he's in a hurry to get there: He recently launched a Japanese search engine, introduced search for ad-supported streaming music, and was first to offer mobile search in China.

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