One year ago, Microsoft released its revamped internet search engine - Bing. Now, the software company may really have reason to celebrate Bing's first birthday. According to the latest report from HitWise, Bing accounted for 9.43 percent of U.S. searches in April 2010.
Microsoft has paved the way to become a major player in the search engine market. Data from comScore shows that the software firm's share of the search market has risen from 8 percent in May 2009 (pre-Bing) to 11.8 percent this past April. A research note from domain analysts at Caris & Co. says Bing has achieved significant milestones in its first year, which the experts say appeared to be "a far cry for Microsoft a few years ago."
As Bing rises, Google's share of the search market has slipped. It dropped slightly to 64.4 percent, comScore reports. The comScore data also reveals that Yahoo's search share has also slipped, though more dramatically. Yahoo shares dropped from 19.6 percent to 17.7 percent.
This may mean that Microsoft is growing at the expense of Yahoo rather than market leader Google. Still, Bing plays nice with the other underdogs - Caris & Co. analyst Sandeep Aggarwal says Microsoft and Yahoo have a "revenue-sharing arrangement" where Microsoft is using Bing to power results and advertising on Yahoo.
