Microsoft became in time the traditional occupant of the third position in the search engine race against Google and Yahoo. The combined results of MSN and Live Search are barely enough to ensure stagnation for Microsoft search. While Google and Yahoo account for in excess of 85% of the search market share, Microsoft is the leader of the pack that feeds on the crumbs from the two giants' feast. The Redmond company has been witnessing the erosion of its search engine share for the past year and the efforts it has poured into the Live suite of products and services have failed to deliver.

According to statistics made available by Compete, MSN and Live Search accounted for 9.1% of the search engine market in June. In this context, Microsoft has managed to increase its search share from 8.4% in May. Still, the Redmond company is still down from the same period of 2006. In June last year, Microsoft's search had a share of 10.1% of the market. And despite the fact that starting in 2007, both MSN and Live Search have indicated signs of reinvigoration, Microsoft has failed to reach the same levels as the past year.

Meanwhile, Google is the only search engine with a constant growth. The Mountain View company is up to 65% the past month from 55% in June 2006. While, just as Microsoft does, Google experiences month to month oscillations, the year over year increase keeps it in the first position with Yahoo as runner up. Compete is reporting that Yahoo's search engine market share is barely double than that of Microsoft. And Yahoo with a share of 20.5% is just like Microsoft losing ground to Google.

Microsoft has not given up on Live Search, or on Windows Live altogether. The company is evolving the online offerings to complement the desktop products in its Software plus Services strategy. Just at the beginning of July, the Redmond company announced a series of changes among the executives for Windows Live.