Yahoo Scout Slighted By Microsoft Scout? And More on Microsoft Web IQ.

Microsoft held its Microsoft Build event and announced Web IQ, a hunt motor level for AI-agents and truthful galore different AI enhancements. But what gave maine a double-take was Microsoft Scout. I mean, didn't Yahoo conscionable denote Yahoo Scout successful January, successful business pinch Microsoft? Why did Microsoft sanction a akin merchandise Scout, erstwhile Yahoo went pinch that sanction and moreover owns the domain sanction scout.com?

Here is really Microsoft described Microsoft Scout:

Microsoft Scout is simply a caller individual supplier for activity that we are bringing to Frontier customers today. Built connected OpenClaw and WorkIQ, Scout understands really you work, uses the devices you already unrecorded in, for illustration Teams and Outlook, and proactively handles things for illustration gathering prep, scheduling conflicts and regular tasks without asking.

I fishy that was wherever Yahoo Scout was heading, I mean, astatine slightest that was the belief I sewage from speaking pinch Yahoo earlier this year.

If you look astatine Yahoo's official announcement of Yahoo Scout, it specifically mentions its business pinch Microsoft connected Yahoo Scout. It says:

Yahoo Scout besides builds connected Yahoo’s long-standing narration pinch Microsoft by leveraging Microsoft Bing’s grounding API. By combining this API pinch Yahoo’s trusted information and contented ecosystem, Yahoo Scout ensures that answers are informed by charismatic sources from crossed the unfastened web. Yahoo is besides joining Microsoft’s Publisher Content Marketplace pilot, reflecting a shared committedness to expanding patient reach, connecting original activity pinch caller audiences, and supporting sustainable gross opportunities for publishers.

If you look astatine my sum of Web IQ, it seems Yahoo was utilizing Microsoft technology, specifically Bing's index, for grounding Yahoo Scout and was moving intimately pinch Microsoft connected this. I don't cognize if Yahoo ended up switching to Web IQ aliases is still utilizing the older level but again, it is conscionable weird Microsoft selected the sanction Scout for this merchandise erstwhile Yahoo, its biggest and astir apt oldest hunt partner, selected Scout already conscionable earlier this year.

And past I saw Jim Lanzone, the CEO of Yahoo, tweet this out:

https://t.co/bDKlUTNb8U pic.twitter.com/DPm6gWHCmN

— Jim Lanzone (@jlanzone) June 2, 2026

This must beryllium a ace awkward business for him correct now.

In immoderate arena - Jordi Ribas, President of Search astatine Microsoft wrote connected LinkedIn astir the hunt broadside of Web IQ, the hunt work for AI-agents - present is what he wrote:

As Satya shared successful today’s keynote astatine Build, we conscionable launched Microsoft Web IQ - our adjacent procreation hunt motor for AI agents. It is simply a caller suite of AI-native grounding APIs designed to link AI systems pinch fresh, reliable web information for enhanced real-world intelligence, including web pages, news, images, and videos.

Search engines for illustration Bing were built for humans, yet the adjacent era of hunt will beryllium for AI agents. Some estimates bespeak that agents will make 1000 times much queries than each hunt engines for humans mixed successful a fewer years, truthful not surprisingly, this is an breathtaking abstraction pinch galore competing solutions already.

To build Web IQ, our hunt squad leveraged much than 20 years of method innovations successful Bing and re-architected the stack to service supplier queries astir efficiently. Web IQ leads crossed the 3 things that matter astir successful this space: quality, latency, and token ratio - arsenic you tin spot successful the graphs of the Bing blog linked below.

As an example, you whitethorn retrieve Harrier, our best-in-class embedding exemplary I posted astir a mates months back, which is still #1 successful the applicable manufacture leaderboard. Harrier plays an important domiciled successful this strategy by helping optimize semantic retrieval, which strengthens the grounding pipeline. It’s conscionable 1 of the galore innovations that helped america build Web IQ.

Web IQ is besides designed to grant patient preferences by default, pinch systems and policies respecting patient controls and contented entree preferences crossed the web.

The APIs successful Web IQ are already powering astir each AI agents and chatbots successful the manufacture today, including Copilot and ChatGPT, truthful Microsoft is presently starring this caller and quickly increasing class of hunt grounding for agents. I’m proud to stock this important activity and to proceed driving invention that is shaping the early of search.

Is Yahoo portion of the community?

Now you cognize really thoughtful we person been astir engaging pinch the community. #WebIQ #Bing #MAI #MicrosoftBuild #Microsoft https://t.co/FGd3wdTLnQ

— Krishna Madhavan (@kmadhavan77) June 2, 2026

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