Microsoft Live Search will be the default on new Hewlett Packard consumer PCs shipped to customers in the U.S. and Canada.

According to the president of Microsoft’s Platforms & Services Division, the agreement is a strategic indicator of the software maker’s increased focus on securing broad-scale distribution for Live Search. “This is the most significant distribution deal for Live Search that Microsoft has ever done, and we are very pleased to be partnering with HP to help bring Live Search to millions of consumers across North America,” Kevin Johnson said.

Customizable Toolbar

Based on Microsoft’s Silverlight platform, the Live Search-enabled browser toolbar will give HP buyers direct access to a variety of online services and tools, including HP’s Snapfish online photo service. Moreover, the new toolbar will be a user-friendly, fully customizable way to give PC users the ability “to access their favorite online services,” noted HP Vice President Ulf Claesson.

Microsoft hopes the deal will allow

it to place more sponsored urls in front of a wider universe of Web users. As the world’s No. 1 PC maker, HP has the potential to give Live Search a higher profile. On the other hand, Microsoft has gone down the road before with mixed results.

In March last year Microsoft announced a similar deal with Lenovo under which Windows Live services began to be preloaded on Lenovo PCs sold worldwide. Five months later, Microsoft’s share of the U.S. search market reached 11.3 percent, according to search-engine performance tracker comScore.

Though it is unclear to what extent the Lenovo deal actually helped Microsoft grow its numbers last year, by April comScore said the software giant’s share of the U.S. search market share had fallen back to 9.1 percent — far behind market leaders Google (61.6 percent) and Yahoo (20.4 percent).

Alternate Strategies

Since abandoning its bid for Yahoo…

Orginal post by Top Tech News