After three years of going steady Mozilla and Yahoo have now called it quits, Mozilla announced the breakup earlier this week in a press release with the introduction of the new Firefox Quantum.
This new introduction appears to be the cause of the split with Quantum replacing Yahoo with Google for the U.S, Canada, Hong Kong and Taiwan as the engine’s default search browser. Mozilla explained that it this change is “part of [their] focus on user experience and performance”.
Despite things moving so quickly in the digital industry the breakup comes as a surprise to many Firefox users with the rollover occurring before an announcement was even made. It’s particularly surprising considering the Yahoo-Firefox affair was set to last at least five years.
On why the parted ways earlier than expected Mozilla’s chief business and legal officer Dennelle Dixons says, “We exercised our contractual right to terminate our agreement with Yahoo based on a number of factors including doing what’s best for our brand…”
Yahoo is yet to make a statement on the split, but despite the amicable parting Yahoo must definitely be feeling the sting as Google’s popularity continues to grow.