MICROSOFT’s grip on the internet browser market is slipping, according to new figures that show the Seattle-based software giant losing market share to a not-for-profit rival.

The company’s Internet Explorer, which is pre-installed on most new computers, continues to dominate the market for providing access to the internet on PCs, but saw its share of the market fall in July with the increasing take-up of rival Firefox.

Microsoft’s browser saw its share dip to 83.1 per cent, down 2.1 percentage points from May this year, according to OneStat, the analytics group.

Firefox, which is developed by the not-for-profit Mozilla Foundation, increased its market share to 12.9 per cent, a 1.1 percentage point increase from May.

The figures cement Firefox’s position as a genuine challenger to Microsoft’s dominance of the browser market. However, Microsoft looks set to hit back at Firefox’s growth with the launch of Internet Explorer 7, which is currently available as a test version and set for full release with Windows Vista, the forthcoming update of Microsoft’s operating system.

While Microsoft continues to dominate the browser market, its share has been gradually falling. In September 2002 it held a 94 per cent market share, with Netscape at that time its nearest rival with 1.2 per cent. Mozilla controlled 0.8 per cent of the market.

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