Ecosia and Qwant reveal a new joint venture, European Search Perspective (EUSP), https://www.eu-searchperspective.com/ to develop and build search engine infrastructure in Europe. EUSP intends to contribute to digital sovereignty within Europe and ensure the continent has a strong, independent alternative to existing search technologies. Starting in 2025, the venture will aim to serve improved search engine results in both the French and German languages, based on Qwant technologies that have been totally redesigned since 2023. This is a move by two of Europe’s leading search engines to provide a solid foundation for future technologies, including AI infrastructure.
Ecosia, headquartered in Germany, is an eco-friendly search engine. With 20 million users, its revenues have been used to plant 216 million trees in 35 countries. Qwant, headquartered in France, is best known for its privacy focus. The new company will operate outside of Ecosia’s steward-owned model—meaning it will be able to raise outside investor capital. Both organizations have historically relied on Microsoft’s Bing platform, with Ecosia switching to a mix of Google and Bing search results last year. Company ownership is shared 50/50 between both parties.
European search engine tech to go-live in 2025
EUSP will develop a privacy-first search index, which will be used by both Ecosia and Qwant. Unlike proprietary solutions, EUSP’s index can be syndicated by search engines and serve as a key resource for the European data industry, providing a transparent and secure data pool for new AI technologies. Both firms will continue existing back-end tech partnerships to ensure the best possible results and product for their respective user-base.
The firm has plans to start serving Qwant and Ecosia’s France-based search engine traffic by the Q1 in 2025. Qwant CEO Olivier Abecassis will run the new venture, with Ecosia supporting financially and consulting with relevant expertise. The existing engineering Qwant team and their developments will be transferred to EUSP in the beginning of 2025, once approvals from stakeholders have been processed. This will expand to also include a significant portion of traffic in Germany by the end of 2025.
At the moment, independent search engines do not typically develop their own back-end technology – instead relying on the existing infrastructure. This includes the delivery of search and news results. Firms such as Ecosia and Qwant previously had to build on top of industry offerings—EUSP makes it possible for Ecosia and Qwant to team up to develop their own tech, and gain more control over their tech stacks.
Greater autonomy in Europe for AI and generative search
The joint venture between Qwant and Ecosia is an important step as regulators, courts and parliaments across EU and U.S. have underlined the importance of diversity and are in the process of opening up entrepreneurial opportunities. The two companies share beliefs about plurality and diversity of thought, digital sovereignty, data security and privacy, sustainability, and a European search perspective.
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