Web space solution

Just about everyone else on the Internet has written on the potential acquisition of Yahoo by Microsoft for $44.6 billion, but I thought that I would weigh in on what I think this might mean for search and Web services. According to ComScore's search share numbers for December 2007, Google has 58.4 percent of the market share, with Yahoo and Microsoft trailing at 22.9 percent and 9.8 percent, respectively. If Microsoft and Yahoo combine forces and change nothing, that will put them at 32.7 percent to Google's 58.4 percent. ***

Security device maker NetScreen Technologies announced on Monday that it signed an agreement to buy Neoteris, a leader in the fast-growing market for virtual private networks based on secure sockets layer technology. The deal--for $245 million in stock and $20 million in cash, with a $30 million bonus if the Neoteris team meets certain sales targets--bumps NetScreen toward the front of the security market for virtual private network (VPN) devices that use encrypted communications technology included in almost every Web browser. The company now has products addressing both of the major secure networking technologies: those based on secure sockets layer (SSL) and those based on the Internet Protocol Security (IPSec) standard, said John Pescatore, vice president for Internet security at business research group Gartner. ***

Microsoft today unveiled pieces of its e-commerce strategy for helping businesses sell to each other, putting its emphasis on getting other software vendors to write industry-specific applications based on Microsoft technology. That differs from Microsoft competitors such as Netscape, Connect, IBM, and Oracle, which have developed e-commerce applications for the inter-business market themselves. "Our strategy differs from competitors, but in the long term, it's good for our customers," said Todd Weatherby, Microsoft's group marketing manager for retail and distribution. "It's a pretty smart play on Microsoft's part," Erina DuBois of Dataquest said. "They don't want to actually build the applications. ***