Soon, Yahoo’s search engine results will have a “Powered by Bing.” tagline. But, the company wants to make it clear that Yahoo is still very much a player in the search race.
Shashi Seth, Yahoo’s Senior Vice President of Search Products, recently defended Yahoo by comparing themselves to outsourcing manufacturers like Boeing and Airbus. Claiming that outsourcing certain technology and manufacturing roles doesn’t make them any less a provider. It was a weird metaphor. And there were probably better ones to choose from.
The truth is, Yahoo is probably on defense mode in terms of its investors. Yahoo wants to assure stakeholders that they’re still a search engine player. To not just move your money to Bing because that’s where the innovations are going to come from. And it’s partly true. Yahoo hasn’t stopped. Yahoo! Search still supplements Microsoft’s Web index with their own proprietary content, content from their third-party relationships and content from social networks.
The technology, science, scale and infrastructure is all there. So perhaps comparing themselves to Boeing wasn’t the best metaphor. It just makes me think less of Boeing.