SafekipediaMozilla Corporation
Adapted from Wikipedia · Adventurer experience
The Mozilla Corporation is a company owned by the Mozilla Foundation. It helps create and improve Internet tools, such as the Firefox web browser. Many people from around the world work together to build these tools.
The Mozilla Corporation is different from the non-profit Mozilla Foundation because it operates as a business.
Even though the Mozilla Corporation is a for-profit company, it uses all of its earnings to support the work of the Mozilla Foundation. Its main goal is to help the Foundation's mission of supporting choice and new ideas on the Internet.
The Mozilla Foundation keeps full control over the Mozilla Corporation. This includes owning all trademarks and intellectual property. The Corporation cannot sell shares or be taken over by another company.
Establishment
The Mozilla Corporation was created on August 3, 2005, to help the Mozilla Foundation with money-related work. The Mozilla Foundation is a non-profit group, so it has limits on how much money it can earn. The Mozilla Corporation, being a for-profit company, does not have these limits. When it started, the Mozilla Corporation took over jobs like organizing the making of Firefox and Thunderbird with help from a global community of developers and managing relationships with businesses.
After the Mozilla Corporation was created, the Mozilla Foundation focused more on guiding the project's rules and policies. In November 2005, when Mozilla Firefox 1.5 was released, the Mozilla Corporation's website at mozilla.com became the new online home for the Firefox and Thunderbird products. In 2006, the Mozilla Corporation made $66.8 million and spent $19.8 million, with most of the money coming from Google for being the default search engine in the browser and for ads shown with search results.
Mozilla Taiwan was a branch of the corporation started on October 19, 2011, to support Mozilla products in Taiwan. It stopped working on August 11, 2020, because of big changes in the parent company.
Finances
Most of Mozilla Corporation's money comes from Google. In 2024, about 86% of their income was from Google for being the default search engine in the Firefox web browser.
| Year | Total revenue | Revenue derived from Google | Total expenses | Software development expenses |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2005 | $52.9 million | 95% ($50.3 million) | ||
| 2006 | $66.9 million | 90% ($60.2 million) | ||
| 2007 | $81 million | 88% ($71.3 million) | ||
| 2008 | $78.6 million | 91% ($71.5 million) | ||
| 2009 | 86% | |||
| 2010 | $123 million | 84% ($103.3 million) | $87 million | $63 million |
| 2011 | $163.5 million | 85% ($139 million) | $145 million | $103 million |
| 2012 | $311 million | 90% ($280 million) | $208 million | $149 million |
| 2013 | $314 million | 90% ($282.6 million) | $295 million | $197 million |
| 2014 | $420 million | 90% ($378 million) | $317 million | $213 million |
| 2015 | $420 million | 90% ($378 million) (from Yahoo, not Google) | $337 million | $214 million |
| 2016 | $520 million | 94% ($488.8 million) | $360 million | $225 million |
| 2017 | $562 million | 93% ($522.7 million) | $421 million | $259 million |
| 2018 | $450 million | 91% ($409.5 million) | $451 million | $277 million |
| 2019 | $829 million | 88% ($405.9 million) | $495 million | $303 million |
| 2020 | $497 million | 86% ($427.4 million) | $438 million | $242 million |
| 2021 | $600 million | 83% ($498 million) | $339 million | $199 million |
| 2022 | $593 million | 81% ($480 million) | $425 million | $220 million |
| 2023 | $653 million | 85% ($555 million) | $496 million | $260 million |
| 2024 | $680 million | 86% ($585 million) | $588 million | $290 million |
Notable events
In March 2006, there was a rumor that Mozilla Corporation made a lot of money the year before, mostly because of a deal with Google. A board member later said the numbers were close to true. In 2006, it was reported that Google paid Mozilla around $57 million to be the default search engine in Firefox. This deal was extended several times over the years.
In August 2006, Microsoft invited Mozilla to work together to make sure Mozilla software worked well with the new Windows Vista operating system. Mozilla agreed to this meeting.
In March 2014, Mozilla faced some criticism when they chose a new CEO. Some people were unhappy with this choice, and a few board members left. Shortly after, the CEO decided to step down. A new CEO was named later that year.
In February 2017, Mozilla bought a service called Pocket, which helped people save and organize web pages. Later, Mozilla announced they would stop Pocket in July 2025, giving users time to save their data.
Mozilla has made several changes over the years, including focusing on new technologies and adjusting its team to meet its goals. In May 2023, Mozilla bought a company called Fakespot, which helped identify fake product reviews online. In February 2024, Mozilla announced changes to focus more on artificial intelligence features in its products. In December 2025, a new CEO was announced to lead Mozilla Corporation.
Affiliations
Mozilla Corporation has a famous relationship with Google. Google was the default search engine in Firefox browsers at first. After the original agreement ended in 2011, Mozilla made a new deal with Google. This deal brought in a lot of money over three years, keeping Google as the default search engine until 2017. Other search engines like Bing, Yahoo!, Yandex, Baidu, Amazon.com, and eBay also worked with Firefox.
In 2022, Google provided a large part of Mozilla’s income. Some people worried about privacy because Firefox used Google’s servers for anti-phishing protection.
Yahoo
In November 2014, Mozilla agreed to make Yahoo the default search engine in Firefox for five years in the US. However, after Yahoo was bought by Verizon in 2017, Mozilla ended this deal early and returned to using Google as the default search engine.
Microsoft
Microsoft’s leaders originally did not see Firefox as a threat. Over time, Microsoft added features to its Internet Explorer browser that were already in Firefox. Despite some disagreements, the teams from Microsoft and Mozilla met to discuss web standards.
IRS audit
The Internal Revenue Service checked Mozilla Foundation’s finances for 2004-2005 because of its income from search agreements. The audit ended in November 2012.
People
Many people who worked for the Mozilla Foundation joined the Mozilla Corporation when it began.
Board of directors
The board of directors is chosen by and reports to the Mozilla Foundation’s board. In March 2014, half of the board members left. The remaining members at that time included:
- Mitchell Baker, Executive Chairwoman
- Julie Hanna[self-published source]
- Karim Lakhani[self-published source]
- Laura Chambers
By 2025, the board members were:
- Kerry W. Cooper, Chair of the Compensation Committee and Member of the Audit Committee
- Laura Chambers
- Bob Lisbonne, Chair of the Audit Committee and Member of the Nominating and Governance Committee
- Hugh Molotsi, Chair of the Nominating and Governance Committee and Member of the Compensation Committee
- Kristin Skogen Lund, member of the Audit Committee
- Mark Surman
Management team
The senior management team includes:
- Anthony Enzor-DeMeo, CEO
- John Solomon, CMO
- Peter Rojas, SVP of New Products
- Eric Muhlheim, CFO
- Carlos Torres, Chief Legal Officer
Notable current employees
Notable past employees
- Brendan Eich, former CEO of Mozilla Corporation, inventor of JavaScript (now CEO of Brave)
- John Lilly, former CEO of Mozilla Corporation
- Christopher Blizzard, former Open Source Evangelist (now at Facebook)
- John Resig, former Technical Evangelist (now at Khan Academy)
- Mike Schroepfer, former VP of Engineering (now at Facebook)
- Mike Shaver, former VP of Technical Strategy (now at Shopify)
- Window Snyder, former Chief Security Officer (now at Square, Inc.)
- Ellen Siminoff, former board member, also President and CEO of Shmoop University and Chair of Efficient Frontier
- Li Gong, president of Mozilla Corporation until 2015
- Andreas Gal, former CTO (now at Apple)
- Johnny Stenback, former engineering director (now at Google Chrome)
- John Hammink
- Tristan Nitot
Images
Related articles
This article is a child-friendly adaptation of the Wikipedia article on Mozilla Corporation, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Images from Wikimedia Commons. Tap any image to view credits and license.