Firefox, Mozilla's most successful web browser based on the Gecko browser engine holds more than 20% of the web-browser market share, according to the latest figures by NetApplications placing it at 21.34%. Web browsers such as Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari have been on a roll in the past 24 months, at the expense of Microsoft Internet Explorer (MSIE) which has been falling in market-share from the 90+ percent it once held.

Mozilla's CEO John Lilly calls this as a significant milestone for Mozilla, and gives credit to the global Mozilla community. NetApplications gets into the details of how Firefox gained a market share growth of 20%, by attributing it to the relatively high number of public holidays between November and December, when users accessed internet from home. This since the significant movers were noted to be home/domestic users rather than corporate users.

Mozilla Corporation today appointed its current chief operating officer John Lilly as CEO, effective immediately. Concurrent with the appointment of Lilly, Mozilla also announced that Mitchell Baker, Mozilla's current CEO, would continue as Chairman and a full-time executive of the corporation. "John Lilly is the right person to guide the maturation of Mozilla," said Mitchell Baker, Chairman of Mozilla Corporation. "John has been instrumental in developing an organization that is both embedded in Mozilla and open-source DNA and that can function at the extremely high degree of effectiveness that our setting requires." As CEO, John will focus on the product, technology and execution of the Mozilla Corporation. Mitchell will focus on bringing Mozilla goals and mindshare to affect change in related aspects of Internet development, such as standards and interoperability, treatment of data, and use of market mechanisms to support public benefit organizations.