New HP-Microsoft Live Search deal is all about Silverlight

Following the recent announcement of Live Search cashback, Microsoft has today disclosed a new deal with HP that is expected to give a slight boost to the usage of both Live Search and Silverlight in the US and Canada, starting in January 2009. The deal centers around a Silverlight-powered toolbar (not to be confused with the recently updated MSN Silverlight toolbar) that Microsoft is specifically developing for HP.

Since HP is currently the world’s largest PC manufacturer, Microsoft has gone straight to the top with this deal, which also happens to be the “most significant distribution deal for Live Search that Microsoft has ever done,” according to Kevin Johnson, president of the Platforms & Services Division at Microsoft. Why not extend the deal to Europe and elsewhere? Microsoft’s not saying, but it’s a good bet that the company doesn’t want to do anything to draw more attention from EU antitrust regulators. At this point, the EU’s history with Microsoft is well known and the software giant has already received a lot of unwanted attention from the group just this year.

Full article: arstechnica.com