Search engine startup Blekko recently announced it has received $30 million in funding, including a substantial sum from Europe’s largest internet company, Yandex.
Blekko launched in late 2010 in hopes of providing searchers with an alternative to Google and even secondary players Bing and Yahoo. Blekko’s primary differentiating factors are its customization capabilities and the general elimination of spam from search results via human-curated SERPs. Though Blekko hasn’t made headlines in recent months, it was noted for fielding more than 1 million queries within weeks of its launch.
Working with Blekko will help Yandex, a Russian search company, tap into the U.S. market and fine tune both of their search products. However, it’s unclear exactly what Blekko’s plans are within the U.S. in terms of creating a niche for itself as the conversation around the engine has fallen flat. Search marketers might anticipate this is part of the company’s effort to make the next big push for Blekko and monitor consumer search trends, accordingly.
In the U.S., Brafton reported earlier this month that Bing and Yahoo have made improvements, but Google still accounts for nearly two-thirds of all searches. Ask.com and AOL sites rounded out the top 5, however, Blekko did not make an appearance on the list.
