Office 2007 standards push on hold for now

Winning recognition for the "Open XML" formats in the new Office 2007 as international standards is a vital step for Microsoft. Without it, governments around the world will be less likely to adopt the new formats (and the Microsoft software in which they are embedded.)

So it is at the least inconvenient for Redmond, and potentially more worrying, that the International Standards Organisation has just added another three months to its review of the matter, following representations from the UK (and possibly other countries.) The ISO already recognises the rival Open Document Format, which has been gaining ground, so matching that is a must for Microsoft. How damaging could this be? Impossible to tell until more details of potential objections become clear, but being forced to return to the drawing board at this stage could cause Microsoft real problems.

Meanwhile, Texas has become the latest US state to join the rush to "open" document formats.

Lighting the way for European search

The latest quest to create a European search engine rival to Google got underway this week as 13 European companies and research institutes met in Rome to kick off the Pharos project. Among them were names like France Telecom, Circom, the body representing more than 300 of Europe's regional broadcasters and Fast, the Norwegian search software company, as well as Germany's Fraunhofer Institute. The meeting comes only weeks after Europe's previous attempt at search came apart at the seams. The "Quaero" project was launched last year by the French and German governments explicitly to create a challenger to Google, but just before Christmas the Germans pulled out because of disagreements over the scope of the project. The Germans, who wanted to focus on text-based search, are now pursuing their own "Theseus" project while the French continue with picture-based Quaero. Into this mix wades Pharos, armed with another classical name and €8.5m in funding from the European Commission.

This time there is less hubris. The project partners are very nervous of saying that they are looking for a "Eurogoogle".

They are at pains to point out that the area of audiovisual search is still wide open for research work. Google's keyword-based algorithms don't work particularly well here and Circom at least has a very genuine interest in finding some technology to help it catalogue its vast libraries of TV footage, without millions of man-hours spent manually tagging films.

But there is also some quiet defiance.

Lycos targets European internet hit

Lycos Europe, the German-based internet company, is starting another push to put European internet development back on the map.

Christoph Mohn, chief executive, said the company is to begin rolling out a pipeline of websites and services, among which he hopes will be a challenger to the dominant US companies like Yahoo, Google, MySpace and Facebook.

Mr Mohn has gathered together what may be Europe's largest internet developer team, some 400 engineers in Germany and Armenia. They have been working for the last 6 years to develop new, innovative internet products that Mr Mohn hopes will help restore Lycos Europe if not to its former glory, than at least to operating profit.

Lycos Europe is certainly in need of a boost. The company has internet service businesses and online dating services which generate revenues, but it has struggled to climb out of the red. Full year figures on Tuesday revealed a €1.7m profit for 2006, compared with a €20.2m loss in 2005, but this was chiefly due to gains from the sale of its Swedish internet access business for €19m.

The first product, Lycos iQ, emerged from the pipeline around a year ago. This is a local search service, much like Yahoo Answers, which allows people to post questions which are answered by real people knowledgeable on a subject. People ask about finding a good dentist in west London or a kindergarten in Munich.

Mr Mohn believes that with products like these Lycos can hold its own against Google.

"Our concept is not to develop a product that is better than Google at the core search product but to develop a search that is different. Around 30 per cent of searches are regional and these searches we can answer very well," Mr Mohn said.

Lycos iQ is the first of many products to be launched. Next week the company is bringing out Jubii.com, a messaging, photo sharing and internet calling site, in the US, right in the internet heartland. Mr Mohn says no one has yet combined these elements in the way he plans to do.

In total Mr Mohn is planning to launch five to 10 internet products each year. The formula is simple and opportunistic: act like a venture capital company backing dozens of different start-ups, and one of them is bound to be a hit.

"If you look at venture-backed start-ups, around 1 in 10 is a hit product, some do ok and you have a handful of flops. If we bring out a range of new products every year, every second year we should have a larger product on the market," he says.

The company will invest around €5m to €10m each year in building its pipeline. The pay-back is expected to start around two years from now, although it could be sooner if one of Mr Mohn's hoped-for hits arrives before then.