Ecosia and Qwant team up to launch an independent search index, challenging Google & Bing

Ecosia, the tree-planting search engine from Berlin, and Qwant, France's privacy-focused search provider, announced a joint venture in November 2024 to develop their own European search index[^5][6]. The partnership aims to reduce their dependence on Microsoft's Bing APIs, which both companies currently rely on for search results[^6].

The new venture, called European Search Perspective (EUP), is structured as a 50-50 ownership split between Ecosia and Qwant[^{6]. Qwant's engineering team and existing search index development will transfer to EUP, with Qwant CEO Olivier Abecassis leading the joint venture[}6].

"The door is open and we are ready to talk to anyone," said Abecassis, while noting they want to "move as fast as possible" with their existing shareholders' support[^{6]. The index will begin serving France-based search traffic for both engines by Q1 2025, expanding to cover "a significant portion" of German traffic by end of 2025[}6].

Rising API costs are a key motivator, following Microsoft's massive price hike for Bing's search APIs in 2023[^{6]. However, neither company plans to completely stop using Bing or Google, instead aiming to diversify their technical foundation as generative AI takes a more central role in search[}6].

[^6]: TechCrunch - Ecosia and Qwant, two European search engines, join forces on an index to shrink reliance on Big Tech