Google's Schmidt Dings Microsoft's Bing
June 09 2009 - 7:57PM
Dow Jones News
Google Inc. (GOOG) Chief Executive Eric Schmidt on Tuesday
shrugged off Microsoft Corp.'s (MSFT) revamped search engine,
dubbed Bing, indicating it wouldn't change his company's approach
to Internet search.
"They have a bunch of new ideas, and there are some things that
are missing," he said in an interview with Fox Business News' Liz
Claman. "We think search is really about comprehensiveness,
freshness, scale and size of what we do. And it's difficult for
them to copy that."
Schmidt made his comments just hours after market research group
comScore Inc. (SCOR) said Bing was "off to a good start" in its
first week since launch, boosting the software giant's search
market share to 11.1% from 9.1%.
A comScore spokesman said Microsoft's gain came primarily at the
expense of Google and second-place Yahoo Inc. (YHOO), but it was
too early to tell whether Bing would steal market share over the
long-term. Prior to Bing's launch, Google had about 64% of the U.S.
search market, while Yahoo's share was about 20%.
"It don't think Bing's arrival has changed what we're doing,"
said Schmidt. "We're about making things enormously successful by
virtue of innovation."
Schmidt also took a swipe at Microsoft's plan to spend as much
as $100 million on advertising to promote Bing, arguing that wasn't
the way to knock the search market leader off its perch.
"You don't buy it with ads. You earn it. And you earn it
customer by customer, search by search, answer by answer," he
said.
Schmidt also said he hadn't yet seen signs of improvement in the
economy, but added the consensus view that the U.S. business cycle
will bottom out this summer is "roughly" correct.
"We don't see it yet. But we think that roughly the consensus is
correct," he said. "From our perspective, we think we're roughly on
schedule."
Shares in Google fell 0.7% to $435.62.
-By Scott Morrison, Dow Jones Newswires; 415-765-6118;
scott.morrison@dowjones.com