Google and Yahoo catch up

I always like to tell a story about Yahoo and Google, which I read from the internet. Larry Page (Google) once tried to sell their search technology to David Filo (Yahoo) for one million, but David Filo turn it down but encourage Larry Page to setup their own business.

Yahoo was using Google search engine from year 2000 to 2003, Yahoo always outsource their search engine to other company like Google and Inktomi, Yahoo focus on their portal business. You all should know what happen later, Google's search portal is getting more and more popular and become a treat to Yahoo. Yahoo drop Google search engine in year 2004.

Google and Yahoo just announce their first quarter financial result (here). Yahoo's revenue was $1.67 billion, less than half Google's $3.66 billion. Two years ago, the two company have almost the same revenue (refer to the cnet story here). Yahoo started three years earlier than Google, now Yahoo try very hard to catch up with Google.

Yahoo and Google are two very successful company, there are many company out there tried to be Yahoo and Google but fail. Yahoo started as a website directory, later transform to content portal and tried to be a media company. Google started as a search engine and focus on it. All Google services are build around their search and online advertisement business.

Yahoo is far behind from Google, in terms of revenue or profit figure, and user experience of their products (email, search engine ...), is time for Yahoo to work harder for a catch up.