• by Gavin O'Malley , Staff Writer @mp_gavin, December 21, 2011

In a deal that means a lot more to Mozilla than Google, the two just renewed their Firefox search deal for the next three years.

For Mozilla, it’s “a crucial arrangement that accounted for roughly $100 million of Mozilla's $123 million in revenues in 2010,” writes eWeek.

As Softpedia reports: “The previous deal ended in November and, when neither Google nor Mozilla made any announcements about it, it became ‘obvious’ that such a deal was never going to happen and that Firebox was dead.”

“Firefox, once dubbed ‘Googlefox’ because of Google's support, now has competition in Chrome, Google's own browser,” writes CNet. “But the overall objective of Chrome is to speed up the Web and improve it as a foundation for applications, not to squeeze other browsers off the Internet.”

“Interestingly,” The Register writes, “the contract renewal comes just weeks after Google's Chrome browser gently brushed past Mozilla's Firefox to become the world's second-favourite surfing tool behind Microsoft's Internet Explorer.”

Either way, the deal was a no brainer, Softpedia adds. “Considering the relationship between Google and Firefox over the years, the fact that Google gets a huge chunk of traffic from Firefox users and the fact that failing to fund Mozilla didn't mean the end the Firefox but it did mean that Bing would be getting a lot of new traffic, there was little reason to doubt that such a deal would come through, even if delayed.”

“Google isn’t one to antagonize an organization that has been in most respects a friendly one, and which of course commands quite a bit of an audience,” seconds TechCrunch, adding: “Obviously the balance of power has changed somewhat and Firefox is no longer the up-and-comer but the incumbent.”

Meanwhile, suggesting that Microsoft was given a crack at bidding for Mozilla’s business, Business Insider writes: “This seems like Microsoft passed up a great opportunity to get more traffic to Bing.”