InfoSpace looks to claw its way back into the search business

Given all of the buzz around Bing and the market dominance of Google, is there really a chance for another search engine to emerge? Bellevue-based InfoSpace -- which today unveiled an upgraded metasearch engine at InfoSpace.com -- is trying to find out.

The company's new offering compiles results across various search engines (Ask, Yahoo, Bing and Google) and incorporates recent Tweets on the subject at hand. In tests this morning, the site -- which is clean and easy to navigate -- performed well and the Twitter search function is quite nifty. But InfoSpace -- which didn't even register in comScore's June search rankings -- has a long, long way to go to become relevant in search. It also has something else working against it.

One has to wonder if there is really any value anymore in metasearch now that the market has essentially boiled down to two players (Microsoft and Google) who together hold more than 90 percent of the market. (Factoring in Microsoft's recent deal with Yahoo.)

Rather than do a metasearch across what amounts to two powerful search engines, users simply can go direct to Google or Bing to find what they need.

InfoSpace has another thing working against it. In a strange move, the company abandoned the InfoSpace.com domain name as part of a business transaction nearly two years ago.

That forced the company -- which continued to operate under the name InfoSpace Inc. -- to invest in its other properties -- including the DogPile search engine. (Can you imagine someone saying, 'I just DogPiled it?')

The company said today that it is excited to have the InfoSpace.com brand back in the fold, but the damage of having the flagship Web site operated by someone else for nearly two years is done.

And now InfoSpace -- which was a contender in the search business in years past -- essentially has to start over again.

“We’re thrilled to have InfoSpace.com back during an emerging time in search technology,” said John Rodkin, the new general manager of search at InfoSpace. “We added pioneering features like comprehensive Twitter search capabilities and configurable results to our latest search service, and we’re working on enhancing the site to meet our users’ interests even more.”

I'll probably give InfoSpace a try based on what I've seen so far, but without a huge marketing effort to compete with the likes of Bing, I imagine it will be tough to gain a foothold.

InfoSpace did have $205 million in cash and cash equivalents on the books at the end of the first quarter, so it could turn up the marketing engines.

But is that money well spent given that Microsoft has promised to spend $80 million to $100 million promoting Bing?

Here's a look at what InfoSpace is up against:

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