23 September 2015.
The Chinese search engine Baidu is considering leaving the US stock market in order to focus its attention purely on the Chinese market.
Baidu first appeared on the US stock market over a decade ago, but the search giant fears that US investors are failing to see the value of the online-to-offline (O2O) market and Baidu's efforts in this market.
Earlier this year, Baidu said that it will be investing over 3 billion US dollars in online-to-offline services in the next 3 years, and according to CEO Robin Li, the company's future lies in services, rather than searching.
Online-to-offline services are those which allow users to do a real-world activity online, such as taxi-hailing and ticket-booking apps.
Baidu's focus on online-to-offline services has been put down to the increasing penetration of smartphones in the Chinese market.Â
