Microsoft has confirmed that it will shut down its MSN portal site in China on June 8. However, the Redmond tech titan did not offer any reason for closing down the portal.
Although Microsoft will close down MSN portal on June 7, it will continue to be "deeply committed" to China, Fortune quoted a statement issued by a company spokesperson. Currently, Microsoft markets Windows 10, Azure cloud services in partnership with local firm 21Vianet in China, besides hosting the company's largest R&D center outside of the United States.
Toward the end of 2015, Microsoft had announced that it was in the process of developing a version of Windows 10 especially for government sector workers. The move came 2 years after Chinese regulators launched an anti-monopoly investigation into Windows' market dominance. In fact, they also banned government purchases of computers running the Windows 10.
On Monday, Microsoft posted an announcement on its MSN China website saying it will shut down the portal on June 7. Aside from delivering Web search services, the MSN portal also offers news and lifestyle information. Following June 7, visitors to cn.msn.com will find a directory page of Chinese websites together with a Bing search bar, the Wall Street Journal reported.
In September, Microsoft entered into an agreement with the Chinese search giant Baidu Inc. to make Baidu.com the default search engine as well as home page of Microsoft's Edge browser in China. The agreement was aimed at boosting the use of Windows 10 in China, where people widely use pirated versions of the operating system.
As a part of the deal, Baidu agreed to make it easier for its customers to update to Windows 10. In addition, the agreement also helped the Redmond tech titan to divert from managing display advertising, which forms the core of MSN. In June last year, Microsoft also entered into a deal with AOL of Verizon Communications Inc. to enable Verizon to acquire the company's display advertising business.
The recent move by Microsoft indicates that despite being a huge market for American tech giants, China is gradually turning into a difficult place for them to do business. Six years ago, Google also decided to close its search service in the country, mentioning censorship problems.
