Netscape Communications Corp has now signed agreements with four more internet search engine companies to provide search facilities on its Netcenter web site. The four are Digital Equipment Corp’s Alta Vista division, InfoSeek Corp, LookSmart Ltd, and Lycos Inc. Earlier this month, Netscape signed a $70m with Excite Inc to become its core search engine partner (CI No 3,403). The new four will become premier providers, meaning that, while Netscape’s branded search (powered by Excite) and direct Excite search engines will each get 25% of the traffic from the Net Search page, the remaining 50% of traffic will be rotated between the other four. The Lycos, InfoSeek and LookSmart agreements are renewals of existing similar deals, although InfoSeek had been tipped to be the core search provider for Netscape until talks broke down. AltaVista previously only had a link from the Netscape page. Yahoo Inc, HotBot, Snap!, AOL and NetFind have not had their existing agreements renewed, although Yahoo and others are likely to be offered lesser distinguished provider agreements with links on the site.
