According to Maxthon International CEO Ming Jie "Jeff" Chen, Maxthon was based on MyIE, a popular modification created by Chinese programmer Changyou to customize Microsoft's Internet Explorer web browser.[11][12] Changyou posted most of the source code[13] for MyIE on his Bulletin board system before leaving the project in 2000. Chen then continued independently developing MyIE and in 2002 released a new version, MyIE2.[14] Users around the world were quite active in contributing to MyIE2's development, adding many plugins, skins and assisting with debugging. MyIE2 was renamed Maxthon in 2003.[11][15]
Internet Explorer is not maxthon
although they have related ties to one another.
I hope this helps
Hugz