Mountain View, Calif.-based search engine Google Thursday says it has acquired Outride. Because the two companies are privately owned, financial details were not available.
The acquisition includes Outride's intellectual property, including patent rights, source code, trademarks, and associated domain names.
"This acquisition is another example of Google's commitment to providing the highest quality search service in the world," says Google co-founder and president of Products Larry Page. "Outride has made significant advances in the field of relevance technology and we believe Google provides the ideal vehicle to continue the development of these technologies."
Redwood City, Calif.-based Outride, a spin-off from Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), was created to apply state-of-the-art model-based relevance technology to the challenge of online information retrieval. PARC is best known for being the place where many technologies were developed including the mouse, Ethernet, Internet standards, flat panel displays and laser printing.
Outride's technologies were designed to enhance productivity from end-users by simplifying the ability to find the right information at the right time.
The acquisition of Outride is the second major purchase for Google this year, in which the company got hold of the Usenet discussion assets from Deja.com.
