I am quite interested what is the business model for Wolfram Alpha. It seems that is rather focused on data analysis then searching.

It might be tough to rely solely on ads, but perhaps companies may be willing to pay to run their computational engine against their own data. It could be a great tool for exploring data.

The queries that we see right now could be hard to monetize. Lack of business cases and probably impractical to go mainstream.

Right now their are not any serious competition for Google. Refining the engine might help a bit, but I don't think their are going to replace ordinary search engine.

Any links or comments regarding the issue?