Mama Search Engines

Mamma.com is a "smart" metasearch engine - every time you type in a query Mamma simultaneously searches a variety of engines, directories, and deep content sites, properly formats the words and syntax for each, compiles their results in a virtual database, eliminates duplicates, and displays them in a uniform manner according to relevance. It's like using multiple search engines, all at the same time.

Created in 1996 as a master's thesis, Mamma.com helped to introduce metasearch to the Internet as one of the first of its kind. Due to its quality results, and the benefits of metasearch, Mamma grew rapidly through word of mouth, and quickly became an established search engine on the Internet. Mamma.com's ability to gather the best search results available from top search sources and to procure an impressive array of advertisers during the Internet boom of the late 1990s caught the interest of many potential investors. In late 1999 Intasys Corporation (Nasdaq: INTA) invested in a 69% stake of the company and in July 2001 bought the remaining shares and now fully owns Mamma.com.

Following the expansion of Mamma.com's banner distribution network via the purchase of the focusIN Specialty Web Network, Mamma.com has increased its emphasis on uniting the marketplace that exists between its search audience and advertiser network.

Now Mamma.com not only provides comprehensive metasearch results, it also has its own proprietary search and banner distribution network. Coupled with this is Mamma.com's advertising solution suite of products, including a pay-per-click solution (PPC), text links, email strategies, banners and contextual based advertising. All solutions can be targeted to specific markets and targeted by geographic IP address. Building on this strong base of products and technology, Mamma.com is able to unite its users with its advertisers in a very relevant and valued manner. This form of targeted advertising provides searchers with the information they are requesting and advertisers with qualified leads.

mamma.com's history

July 1996: Mamma.com goes live as one of the Web's first metasearch engines and rightfully dubs itself "The Mother Of All Search Engines". Mamma was developed as a Master's thesis at Ottawa's Carleton University by Herman Tumurcuoglu.

1996-1998: Mamma grows slowly through word of mouth. A handful of people work with Tumurcuoglu to turn the search engine into a source of income. Banners are sold to advertisers and Mamma begins to license its technology to other websites; Tumurcuoglu realizes early that revenues do not have to be limited to Mamma.com's own immediate traffic.

July 1999: A banner sales force, business development team, and a technology division are created at Mamma. In the height of the dot-com boom, Mamma sees its niche.

November 1999: Intasys Corporation (NASDAQ: INTA) invests US$25,000,000 and takes 69% ownership of Mamma.

December 1999: An aggressive advertising campaign is launched with a billboard in New York's famed Times Square. Millions of New Yorkers gather to celebrate and bring on the new Millennium under Mamma's presence.

January 2000: Mamma sees the value in selling search result rankings and develops the Premium Search Result Placement Program. The advertisers are shuffled in with the metasearch results. Unlike bid-engines, Mamma does not reveal the advertiser's cost-per-click (CPC).

March 2000: Mamma's advertising campaign continues with a TV commercial; it airs on CNNfn, MSNBC, and Bloomberg.

Summer 2000: Mamma redesigns its site and brings the Mamma character to life.

August 2000: Mamma creates, "Mamma Recommends". CPC advertisers are given exclusive placement in the top two positions and are featured under a "Mamma Recommends" header.

January 2001: Mamma begins in-house development of a proprietary banner delivery system.

March 2001: Banner delivery system, ADS (Ad Delivery System), launched. The development team begins research on Mamma's automated registration system.

April 2001: Founder, Tumurcuoglu, resigns - Mamma begins new chapter.

July 2001: Intasys Corp. buys out minority shareholders and take 100% ownership of Mamma.

August 2001: The first phase of ASI (Automated Sales Initiative) is launched allowing Mamma to reach thousands of potential advertisers in a few months.

September 2001: Mamma and Intasys announce Guy Fauré as new President and CEO of Mamma.

October 2001: "Mamma Recommends" is renamed "Mamma Classifieds" (ensuring that users understand they are paid listings) and is increased to three positions at the top of the results page.

December 2001: Mamma.com branches out its distribution revenue streams and begins to display their advertisers' banners on other web properties.

April 2002: Mamma.com redesigns the homepage and gives the Mamma character a third dimension.

June 2002: Beta version of Mamma.com's customized registration system, ADS, is launched; advertisers can now sign-up online.

December 2002: Mamma.com buys focusIN Specialty Web Network to expand distribution of its search and banner networks.

February 2003: Mamma.com institutes new measures to detect and protect its advertisers against fraudulent activity.

June 2003: Banners are removed from Mamma.com, in an effort to make the site cleaner, and more user-friendly.

July 2003: In the ongoing effort to clean up the site, homepage text advertisements, Mamma Favorites, are permanently removed.

August 2003: Mamma.com's ranking algorithm, which eliminates the subjective ordering of metasearch results, celebrates its first year anniversary.

August 2003: The beta version of ADS, Mamma.com's online client account management system, is retired and a new version is released.

September 2003: Parent company, Intasys Corp. sells its other holdings, and focuses exclusively on Mamma.com.

October 2003: Mamma.com's Power Search page is relaunched, and enables users to perform advanced searches, as well as to save preferences.

November 2003: Mamma.com offers geo-targeting to Mamma Classifieds clients.

January 2004: Mamma.com's parent company, Intasys Corporation, officially merges with Mamma.com and becomes Mamma.com Inc. Mamma is now recognizable on NASDAQ with the ticker symbol MAMA.

February 2004: Mamma.com consolidates its offerings under the Mamma Media Solutions brand identity. The metasearch engine continues to operate as Mamma.com - The Mother of All Search Engines, now a Mamma Media Solutions product.