Search Musical Chairs
February 15, 2008
Running a search business is tough. Being involved in search and retrieval is no picnic either. The game of musical chairs that dominates the news I review comes as no surprise.
For example, Yahoo’s Bradley Horowitz, head of advanced projects, pulls in the Google parking lot now. You can read his “unfortunate timing” and “I really love Yahoo” apologia Horowitz apologia link. The executive shifts at Microsoft are too numerous for me to try and figure out. The search wizard from Ask.com — Steve Berkowitz — has turned in his magic wand to Microsoft security. You can read more about that Microsoft shuffle link. The low profile SchemaLogic lost one of its founders a month ago, although the news was largely overlooked by the technical media. Then, in Seattle on February 13, I heard that changes are afoot in Oracle’s secure enterprise search group. In short, the revolving doors in search and retrieval keep spinning.
But there are even larger games link afoot. For example, T-Mobile embraced Yahoo. Almost simultaneously, Nokia snuggled up to Google. (Note: the links to these news stories go dark without warning, and I can’t archive the original material on my Web site due to copyright considerations.) The world of mobile search continues to be fluid, and we haven’t had the winner of the FTC spectrum auction announced yet. As these larger tie ups play out, I want to keep my eye on telco search companies that are off the radar; for example, Fast Search & Transfer’s mobile licensees might be jetting to different climes when the Microsoft acquisition is completed. A certain large behind-the-scenes vendor of mobile search is likely to be among the first to seek a new partner.
At the next higher level, the investment banks continue to take a close look at their exposure in search and related sectors. With more than 150 companies actively marketing search, content processing, and utilities, some major financial institutions are becoming increasingly concerned. What once looked like a very large, open-ended opportunity has a very different appearance. The news that Google touches more than 60 percent of online search traffic leaves little wiggle room for online search competitors in the US and Europe. Asia seems to be a different issue, but in the lucrative US market, Google is the factor. In the behind-the-firewall sector Microsoft – Fast and Google seem destined to collide. With that looking increasingly likely, IBM and Oracle will have to crank up their respective efforts.
In short, at the executive level, sector level, and investment level, speed dating is likely to be a feature of the landscape for the next six to nine months. If someone were to ask me to run a search-centric company, I would push the button on my little gizmo that interrupts telephone calls with bursts of static. The MBAs, lawyers, and accountants who assume leadership positions in search-centric companies are wiser, braver, and younger than I. Unfortunately, as the bladder of their confidence swells, the substance behind that confidence may prove thin indeed.
I have resisted making forecasts about what the major trends in search and retrieval will be in 2008. I can make one prediction and feel quite certain that it will hold true.
The executive turnover in the ranks
of search and content processing
companies will churn, flip,
and flop throughout 2008.
The reason? Too many companies chasing too few opportunities. The wide open spaces of search are beginning to close. Beyond Search contains a diagram showing how the forces of Lucene, up-and-coming vendors with value-priced systems, and embedded search from super platforms like IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle are going to make life very interesting for certain companies. When the pressure increases, the management chair becomes a hot seat. The investors get cranky, and the Bradley Horowitz’s of the world find a nice way to say, “Adios.”
Stephen Arnold, February 15, 2008
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