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Google’s failure to acquire Groupon stole the headlines this past week, but this story has overshadowed some other interesting developments in the local search arena. While Google might have hit a snag in its efforts to increase its presence in this market, eBay has been making moves of its own. The Wall Street Journal ran a story by Scott Morrison of the Dow Jones Newswire reporting eBay’s purchase of Milo, a “local search engine” that has “developed software that can plug into a merchant’s inventory management system, enabling the start up to instantly keep tabs on all of the retailer’s products.” EBay CTO Mark Carges suggested that this move will help the giant online marketplace integrate its internet sales with in-store activity. This will presumably allow shoppers to more easily locate stock online which they can then purchase and perhaps pick-up themselves.
More interesting (at least to this reader) is the relation of this acquisition to eBay’s recent purchase of RedLaser, the mobile app that allows users to scan barcodes using their mobile phones. Morrison reports that eBay plans to integrate the two technologies, potentially allowing in-store shoppers to find the local store with the best price for a given item. Bringing the power of the internet and search into the stores sounds promising and potentially more revolutionary than simply putting inventory data on eBay. Time will tell!
More on the web:
Scott Morrison, “UPDATE: EBay Buys Local Shopping Search Engine Milo,” The Wall Street Journal (12/02/2010).
Amir Afrati, Gina Chon, and Geoffrey A. Fowler, “Google Talks With Groupon Are Ended Without Deal,” The Wall Street Journal (12/04/2010).
Evelyn M. Rusi and Jenna Wortham, “Groupon Said to Reject Google’s Offer,” The New York Times (12/03/2010).
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