In November 2011, however, Mozilla’s contract with Google will expire. It will then be renewed… or it will be allowed to lapse.

Google’s status as the default search engine for the majority of 450 million Firefox users directly translates into millions — and possibly billions — of dollars of revenue.

If Google fails to renew its contract with Mozilla, do you think that Microsoft would blink an eye at spending $85 million for the majority share of Firefox’s 450 million surfers?

If this actually happens — if Bing is suddenly the default search engine for hundreds of millions of surfers — then we’re talking about a monumental shift that would probably redefine the web.

More importantly, however, if Bing becomes Firefox’s default search engine in November, the world would finally have a second search engine that might be able to stand up to the overwhelming and indomitable force of Google’s web supremacy.
[extremetech.com ]