Microsoft aims at Google, stays friendly with Yahoo
InfoWorld | at | by Mike
Microsoft is beefing up its MSN search engine to go head-to-head with Google, but at the same time has no immediate plans to cancel its agreement for paid search listings with Overture Services, which was recently bought by MSN rival Yahoo.
"MSN Search falls into the category of our [key] businesses," said Lisa Gurry, group product manager for MSN in an interview at Microsoft's headquarters here on Friday. "We are working on building our own search engine from scratch."
While seeking to aggressively compete with Google, Microsoft appears to be taking a different tack with Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Yahoo. Microsoft, for now, continues to use technology from Yahoo-owned Inktomi for MSN Search and has no plans to pull its agreement with Overture for paid search listings on MSN Search.