In the current state of the web, nobody is going to beat Google at search. Google has been tweaked and squeezed for every last ounce of searchy-goodness over the past decade, and it shows by how they dominate the web. (With that said though, Bing rocks Google at both Image and Video search)

Google is so entrenched into the Internet and the minds of average users that it's going to take a paradigm change on the web to bring up a new level playing field.

It's the same way with Microsoft + the Operating System, Apple + the iPod, and so forth.

For any of these companies to get disturbed from their positions, the landscape and the playing field needs to change. This is best exemplified by how Sony used to dominate the portable music market until MP3 and digital music became possible and Apple eventually took over.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you view it), these broad technological jumps don't happen every year, so companies often stay in a position of domination until the whole game is changed in front of them.