Microsoft has announced its intention to open three new centers in Britain, France and Germany, which will deal with the improvement and development of new search technology on the Internet. According to officials software giant step aims at reducing the technological lead of Google, in addition, analysts believe Microsoft in economic stability in Europe. The centers will be located near Paris, London and Munich. For several years, number of researchers in these centers will be increased to several hundred people, said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. At the initial stage, the company contributed to the opening of the centers $ 600 million, but the final amount is not reported. According to sources, the money lent out $ 45 billion, which were prepared by Microsoft to buy Yahoo. As stated by the Minister of Economy Christine Lagarde, her Government would provide tax incentives for Microsoft research work at the rate of 30-50%. She also said that the center of Paris will open tentatively in March 2009 after a failed deal with Yahoo, Microsoft rushed to the area of Internet search in order to somehow withstand the onslaught from Google. Google processes about 60% of all searches in the U.S. and about 80% – in Europe. Microsoft, in turn, owns 2% of the European market.