Foreign anti-virus vendors set to lose approved status

Wang Jian, an analyst with Analysys International, said that with the rising innovation capacity of Chinese firms, the technology gap between Chinese and foreign anti-virus software companies is shrinking.

"By naming five Chinese brands to the government procurement list, more and more Chinese enterprise users, especially those with close ties with government, are expected to switch to domestic software providers," she said.

When the Beijing-based Qihoo started to offer free anti-virus software to Chinese consumers years ago, many Western software developers pinned their hopes on paid enterprise users.

Symantec was the market leader in China's enterprise-level anti-virus software in 2013. The top five firms had a combined market share of 56.8 percent, and only one of those five companies was Chinese, according to IDC China.

Qihoo enjoys a dominant position in consumer anti-virus software, but since being included on the government procurement list in July 2013, it has seen double-digit growth in enterprise users every month.

"An increasing number of enterprise users have contacted us after reading the government procurement list," said An Yang, an Internet security expert from Qihoo. He said that anti-virus software contributes to about 60 percent of his company's revenue in enterprise security.

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