Google said Wednesday that Gmail is now available in Burmese, marking the 74th language for the popular email service.
"As a country of 53 million, Myanmar's recent opening-up has triggered an explosion of people coming online," Google product manager Brian Kemler said in a blog post.
"As recently as 2011, a mere 500,000 Myanmar citizens were able to access the Internet, which was less than one percent of the population," he added.
He said the number of people in Myanmar who can get online has grown to 2.6 million, as the availability of mobile phones has increased.
Kemler noted that "our team has been working hard to ensure Google is ready to support this new community in their own language."
"To capture the nuances of this language and make sure the translations were accurate, consistent and complete, we relied on an array of Myanmar speakers from within the country, and around the world," he said.
"In April 2013 we launched Google Search in Myanmar, and today we're excited to announce that Gmail now supports Myanmar (Burmese), our 74th language."
A quasi-civilian regime that came to power in 2011 has ushered in a new era of political openness in the Asian country but a clause under the junta-era constitution still bars Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi from the presidency.
Google unveils reorganization in Europe
New York (AFP) Feb 25, 2015 –
Google said Wednesday it was launching a reorganization of its European operations in the face of a tougher regulatory environment.
The overhaul was first reported by the Financial Times, citing Matt Brittin, an executive who will head a new unit unifying two separate European divisions.
Google's press office confirmed the reorganization in an email to AFP without elaborating.
Sources familiar with the reorganization said it was aimed at simplifying Google's structure in Europe and responding better to customers and policymakers in the region.
The move comes with Google under pressure in Europe on compliance with rules giving residents a "right to be forgotten," which requires the online giant to remove certain information in search queries.
Google is also facing a four-year-old antitrust investigation by EU officials and efforts by some EU countries to impose taxes on profits that are shifted to low-tax jurisdictions.
Amid complaints from news organizations which claimed the US firm was eating away at online revenues, Google shut its popular online news service in Spain in protest at a law which would make it pay for content.
The British government in December slapped a new tax rate on multinational companies that seek to avoid paying their fair share to Treasury coffers.
The levy — nicknamed the 'Google tax' because of the high number of technology firms seeking to avoid tax — will come into force in April.
Brittin was quoted as saying the changes were also a response to competitive pressures, particularly from Silicon Valley rivals.
"Just talking with publishers the other day, many get most of their traffic from Facebook or Twitter, not from Google," he told the FT.
Brittin, who headed the northern and western European operations for Google, will take over a new unit that includes the company's southern and eastern European division. He will be based in London.
