An analysis of MSFT's search war strategy

Comscore report published that Bing combined with Yahoo has now 41% search market share. This result is doubtful. However, it is possible for Bing to get increased search share from Facebook queries.

The MSFT's search strategy began with an ambition to make another search engine like Goog. I believe that Gates thought about using their PC domination, friend company network in gaining market from Goog exactly the way they killed Netscape. However, Goog rises into a giant business with increasing advertising dollar.

In phase one of the search war, MSFT had their own loyal engineers working in search. But, the leadership soon realized that search has more "algorithms" and "AI" and it is development of "distributed systems" and internet services which is certainly different that PC based software applications. In second phase, MSFT started following Goog's recruitment pattern hiring PhDs and scientists. They also replaced the position of head of search with someone who has more academic background in IR. However, the strategy of making a better Google search remained same. Goog at the same time made better email service, a better translation service and many other new services that MSFT leaders could not think ahead of time. In the third phase, MSFT leaders realizes that Goog has a platform and two sided effect has already made them very powerful and it is almost impossible to gain search market share without innovation. Traditionally innovation is weakest in MSFT's product development. They then hired veterans from falling Yahoo to run their search business and they started making "Bing" as a decision engine. This is a new phase for MSFT's search and also it is a new generation for MSFT's strategy. They still lack an out of the box original something that can make Bing attractive choice for search and unfortunately, this is hard unless MSFT makes it strategically important to make innovation in search and can spread across their org. An example of such innovation by MSFT is "kinnect" and "xbox live".

On Oracle's legal battle with Google on Java!

Oracle's legal battle with Google brings the debate on U.S patenting system itself. It is ridiculous to patent a programming language architecture. Imagine the situation if Tony Hoare wants a share for using quick sort which is almost ubiquitous in databases or any large computing systems or UT Austin wants share for Dijkstra's shortest path algorithm from Cisco or Google or any other company that is using shortest path for any application. Although, I got a few patents and I completely understand that it is just a corporate tool to protect them in face of competition and it has no other purpose. I would always vote for eradicating this ridiculous system. Oracle's motivation is in fetching some free money from Google. Oracle really did nothing with the patents they had purchased from Sun and now they wanted to use those patents.

G+ and Facebook comments

G+ with their circle and hangout features provides more natural and richer expressiveness for social than Facebook. It is a clean UI design and a neat piece of software and has been distributed so far quite cleverly. Facebook will need to innovate and make their product better. It's not hard for G+ to gain market share using their existing products. I believe G+ will stay and will be more competitive soon in future. G leadership is one of the best among Tech corps.