During the recent antitrust trial against Google, surprising revelations emerged about the behind-the-scenes negotiations between Apple and Microsoft regarding Safari’s default search engine. Despite more than generous offers from Microsoft to power Bing, Apple categorically refused. Here’s a look at the reasons behind this refusal.
Bing’s quality falls short of Apple’s expectations
Eddy Cue, Apple’s senior vice president of services, didn’t mince his words. For him, Bing is simply “inferior” to Google Search in terms of the relevance of results for users. An internal study conducted by Apple in 2021 confirmed Google’s supremacy on almost all criteria, with the exception of the desktop interface.
But the biggest sticking point seems to be Bing’s ability to generate enough ad revenue for Apple. Even with a 100% revenue payout offer, Cue isn’t convinced. He calls Bing’s ad monetization performance “horrible” compared to Apple’s extremely lucrative deal with Google, which paid around $20 billion in 2022 for its top spot on Safari.
A golden partnership with Google that is difficult to challenge
Breaking the deal with Google in favor of Microsoft would cause Apple to lose considerable revenue, according to its CEO Tim Cook. As a reminder, Mountain View would pay Apple more than $20 billion per year to remain the default search engine for Safari. Google’s teams have also calculated that Microsoft would have to pay 122% of Bing’s revenue just to match its current offer to Apple. A sacrifice that is difficult to imagine.
Beyond the financial aspect, it is also the strength of the Google brand that makes this partnership so valuable in Apple’s eyes. “It’s a great product for our customers and we want them to know they have access to the best search engine,” insists Eddy Cue. Partnering with Bing, which is much less popular than Google, would risk disappointing demanding users of Apple products. Finally, Google’s unrivaled advertising expertise secures Apple’s revenues in the long term, which considers this deal to be “the safest option”. Only a major problem with Google could shake up this win-win partnership in the future.
Despite Microsoft’s hopes of taking advantage of the rise of generative AI with the new Bing to reshuffle the cards, the judge in charge of the case believes that this technology will not disrupt the search market “in the near future”. Google can therefore watch it come serenely, comforted by the unwavering confidence that Apple has in it. Bing’s ambitions on Safari seem definitively buried.