When In Doubt, Buy Them Out!
Here I am yet again on a Friday morning enjoying a fine cup o' Joe and reading world news. Its a typical Friday morning for me as I gain my caffeine energy boost; that is until I read one of today's headlines "Microsoft bids $45 billion for Yahoo" on CNNMoney.com.
Seriously? Does Microsoft really want to play this game? I thought they learned their lesson well over a decade ago about monopolizing a market but I guess some companies are natural inclined to repeat mistakes like some governments I know.
If Yahoo! bites on the lucrative $45 billion dollar bid from Microshaft, what will this mean to the SEO community and to search in general? What will happen to MSN Search & Yahoo! Search? Will the two entities become one or just share algorithm components on the backend? Will one of the two search engines disappear like Teoma or DirectHit when they were bought out by Ask.com?
Well, I’m doubting the two companies would consolidate the two engines into one. There’s just too many loyal users of each to play that card. I actually envision the two entities just sharing backend technology such as Yahoo!’s Inktomi to increase relevancy of MSN Search & Live.com both of which have been struggling of late to increase their meager search market shares.
It should be VERY interesting to see what transpires in the event Yahoo! accepts the bid.
There you go again Microsoft! If you can’t beat ‘em, buy ‘em!!!