Google is considering pre-installing its Chrome browser on personal computers in the search giant’s latest challenge to the dominance of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

The move would significantly ramp up the browser war that Google launched against Microsoft when it launched Chrome in September, in the battle to dominate how users access and interact with the web.

Latest industry figures show that Internet Explorer currently enjoys a 71.3 per cent market share worldwide, with Mozilla Firefox at nearly 20 per cent. Chrome is used by less than 1 per cent of all web users, but is still under public testing before a final version is ready to launch.

Speaking to The Times, Sundar Pichai, Google Vice President, Product Management, revealed that Chrome will be ready to come out of “beta” testing by January, and that the search giant was looking at ways to make Chrome the browser of choice for the everyday user.

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“We will probably do distribution deals,” he said, adding, “we could work with an OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) and have them ship computers with Chrome pre-installed.”

He added that versions of Chrome should also be available of computers using Macintosh or Linux software in the first half of next year, allowing the browser to be used on almost 99 per cent of computers worldwide.

Analysts said that Microsoft eventually defeated Netscape Navigator in the first browser wars during the late 1990s primarily because Internet Explorer came installed on computers that operated the Windows operating system, and as a result became the default choice for most web users.

Richard Holway, Chairman of Tech Market View, the industry analysts, said that due to strict anti-trust rulings since, it would be hard to block Google doing deals with computer makers to install Chrome on their PCs.

He said: “If any manufacturer wished to install Chrome, that should now be possible.”

Microsoft said it would not comment on its current commercial or distribution deals with hardware manufacturers. John Curran, UK head of Windows, said he believed Microsoft can withstand the threat posed by Google’s Chrome.

“The browser space is competitive and people end up choosing what’s best for them,” he said. “For the overall majority of UK users, that’s Internet Explorer.”

The latest version of Microsoft’s browser, Internet Explorer 8, was launched in August. It will come as standard with all PCs using the latest version of its operating system, Windows 7, which should be ready be used on most computers by January 2010.

Mr Pichai said that once a glitch-free version of Chrome browser is launched early next year, Google will make a determined push to advertise its browser to the wider public.

Mr Pichai said: “We will throw our weight behind it. We’ve been conservative because its still in beta, but once we get it out of beta we will work hard at getting the word out, promoting to users, and marketing will be a part of that.”

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