Yahoo– search engine

Yahoo pioneered the online commercial directory concept when it first launched the service in 1994 but did not pay much attention to search services during its initial days, preferring to source it from other parties like Open Text, Alta Vista, Inktomi and eventually, Google. Yahoo realized the importance of search engines in the late 90s when they
gained prominence and started affecting e-commerce to a level that almost a third of online ad revenues were generated through them.

Yahoo started focusing on search engine business starting October 2002, by outsourcing the service to Google. The purchase of Inktomi for $235 million in late 2002 and subsequently Overture in October 2003 (for $ 1.6 billion) made Yahoo the owner of two of the largest and the oldest of the commercial paid search services. This also gave Yahoo 100 billion new users and the capability to promote its own internal search engine through innovative advertising solutions that competed with Google’s AdWords and AdSense programs.

In February 2004, Yahoo scrapped its relations with Google and began using its own search engine instead. The Cable News Network (CNN), the leading media giant, replaced Google for Yahoo in May 2004 to provide algorithmic and paid results to its users.