Over time, references to Quaero have become less and less frequent; it seemed that the French search project was more likely to fade from existence than challenge Google. The European Commission has approved $152 million in state aid, however, so Mountain View might not want to forget about it.
Germans Bail From Quaero Partnership
France and Germany had great plans to take on Google for search engine dominance, but the French will have to go it alone as Germany withdraws from the project.
Quaero: French Search Or N.C. Firm?
The much-discussed Quaero project, in development with French tech giant Thomson, adds Bertelsmann AG as the German project lead and partner in the venture; apparently neither of them bothered to do a whois lookup on the name first.
The Quaero Oxymoron
If you’ve been following the story of the Franco-German Quaero project – a planned European multimedia search engine, the answer to Google and brainchild of the French government – you’ll know that European politics have contributed to the mire it’s been in for some months.