BUSINESS BRIEF
Firefox Share Dips in July

The open-source Firefox browser saw growth slip in July, according to the latest report from measuring and monitoring service NetApplications, which watches growth in adoption among a variety of popular Internet browser alternatives.

The NetApplications report for the month of July indicates that, for the first time, Firefox slightly receded in its rise against Microsoft's (Nasdaq: MSFT) Internet Explorer. Firefox's growth for July was 8.07 percent, down from an all time high of 8.71 percent in June. Meanwhile, Microsoft grew to 87.2 percent in July up from 86.56 percent during June of 2005.

Macintosh staple Safari posted modest growth of 2.13 percent while most other browsers experienced little change during the same time period.

"Mozilla recently created a for-profit division just in time to see its Firefox browser drop 0.7 percent in 30 days," said NetApplications COO Dan Shapero. "Microsoft's Internet Explorer actually gained ground at the expense of Firefox recent stride."

Other browsers included in the report were Netscape, with 1.5 percent growth, Opera, with 0.49 percent, and the Mozilla browser, with 0.52 percent growth for the month.