Microsoft and Google: Partners or Rivals?
According to company executives and others briefed on the discussions, Microsoft – desperate to capture a slice of the popular and ad-generating search business – approached Google within the last two months to discuss options, including the possibility of a takeover.
So what exactly are MSFT’s strengths? Every business line is losing money except the OS business and that due exclusively to its monopoly status.
They bought HotMail but took 2-3 years to convert it’s infrastructure to Windows — many times longer than it took to build it initially with open source tools.
And now, even give their control of the desktop and their colossal bankroll, they admit they can’t build a search engine to rival Google and would buy it instead.
I hope it doesn’t go that way: I rely on Google and would hate to see it become unreliable.