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The U.S. Dominates Search, But Europeans Want In On Their Own Terms

The Web is global, and therefore, so is search. But everything about the search industry, from technology to marketing to overarching trends, is dominated by companies based in the U.S., and an EU think tank recently got together to discuss ways to bolster innovation, thought-leadership and corporate development, European style.

One of the topics discussed was Google's global footprint, and whether it was a "near-monopoly" that made it hard for strong European alternatives like Exalead to succeed. Google's representative argued that the company couldn't just be considered a U.S. entity anymore -- after all, a majority of its paid and organic traffic now comes from outside the U.S., and the company has a number of international hubs.

The Pandia Search wrote a position paper to help foster the dialogue. "The traditional argument of supporting R&D and innovation in order to develop European alternatives to a U.S. hegemony makes less sense in a world where more and more of the European companies are acquired by Non-European firms," the team said. "Instead of focusing on the development of companies owned and controlled by Europeans, the objective should be to develop Europe-based search engine technology clusters that generate innovation in general."

Read the whole story at Pandia Search News »

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