In response to today’s news that Google is releasing its own browser, code-named Chrome, I decide to call John Lilly, CEO of Mozilla Corp., the folks behind the fast growing Firefox browser. My intention was to find out what he thought about this development especially since they have been viewed as close personal partner of Google.

The open source browser maker depends heavily on a lucrative financial deal they have signed with the search company. The recently renewed the deal to last through 2011. Was Lilly worried about yet another browser in the market? After all the emergence of Linux has had an equally deflationary impact on the UNIX market. Can a Google browser promoted on Google home-page and pushed through Google’s mobile OS cause Mozilla Firefox to find itself on a sticky wicket?

“We collaborate with them on a bunch of things and we have a financial relationship,” Lilly says. “So there is another browser and that makes to a more competitive world. Of course we would have to compete.”

Given that Microsoft still controls around 72% of the browser mark