It appears we have lost another Japanese search engine. Ask.jp has announced that they are reorganizing to focus on B2B solutions. Their consumer search will cease operations on June 25. This includes their general web search.

The Japanese press release is here: Ask.jp ends search service [static.ask.jp]

Ask Jeeves Japan had been in operation at the beginning of this decade offering corporate search services. They opened a beta version in 2004 [webmasterworld.com] for a full consumer level search engine. In 2005 [webmasterworld.com] they came out of beta and signed an agreement with Google to provide the site with sponsored links.