Yahoo has made it official: Microsoft Bing is now powering the back end of Yahoo searches in the U.S. and Canada.
Earlier this week Yahoo announced Microsoft’s Bing Internet search platform would shortly begin handling “organic” searches for Yahoo users in the U.S. and Canada; now, Yahoo has made it official, formally announcing that Yahoo Web, image, and video searches for desktop and mobile services are now powered by Bing’s platform for English-languages searches in the U.S. and Canada. The announcement is the first significant fruit of the far-reaching ten-year search partnership between the companies that emerged after Microsoft’s abortive attempt to take over Yahoo in a hostile takeover back in early 2008.
Yahoo says that it is not giving up on the search business: it intends to continue developing its own front end for Internet searches and create new search related products and services for its users; the difference is that the search engine underneath those Yahoo services and applications in now Microsoft’s Bing, rather than Yahoo’s own technology.
“Yahoo will continue to drive technology innovation in the search experience to bring more value to users and advertisers alike,” wrote Yahoo’s senior VP for search products Sashi Seth, in a blog post. “We are focused on creating rich, immersive experiences that foster serendipitous discovery for people across the Yahoo network.”
Bing will start powering Yahoo searches in additional markets—and additional languages—in the months to come; in the meantime, the companies are focuses on migrating Yahoo search advertising customers to Microsoft’s self-serve AdCenter pay-per-click advertising platform.
