Is Yahoo Growing?

Yahoo’s share gains since November from a partnership with Mozilla may be a clue about whether the search company can gain new users through the just-announced contract to change Internet Explorer’s and Chrome’s default search through installations of Oracle’s Java.

Although the news of the Yahoo-Oracle partnership got the lion’s share of attention, CEO Marissa Mayer also used last week’s shareholder meeting to mention the Mozilla pact.

The five-year contract with Mozilla, the maker of Firefox, has boosted Yahoo’s share of the U.S. search market, but growth has stalled for the last three months, according to measurement company comScore.

On Wednesday, Mayer asserted that the Mozilla deal — negotiated last fall — was “profitable,” but didn’t provide any numbers to back that up. Neither Yahoo nor Mozilla has disclosed how much the former paid to become Firefox’s default search engine in the U.S.

By comScore’s measurement, Yahoo accounted for 12.7% of all U.S. searches in May, the same share it controlled in both March and April. Although that was 2.5 percentage points higher than in November 2014 — before Firefox began urging users to accept Yahoo as the default — and represented a six-month increase of 25%, May’s share was down from the January peak of 13%.

From all indications, Yahoo has gotten as much out of the Firefox deal as it will likely get. The flip-side is that Yahoo has hung onto most of what it grabbed from Google — Firefox’s previous default — even as Google has tried to get users to return.

For May, comScore pegged Google’s share at 64.1%, down one-tenth of a percentage point from the month prior. Microsoft’s share rose that one-tenth of a point to end May at 20.3%. Because Bing powers Yahoo’s search results, Microsoft’s technology accounted for 31.4% of all U.S. searches, still less than half Google’s 65.2%.

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Jawbone Sues Fitbit

Jawbone has filed another lawsuit against Fitbit in less than two weeks, alleging its activity tracking products infringe several of Jawbone’s patents.

The new suit, filed Wednesday in San Francisco by Jawbone parent company AliphCom, seeks unspecified damages and an injunction to block the sale of Fitbit devices such as the Flex, Charge and Surge bands.

Late last month, Jawbone filed another lawsuit, accusing Fitbit of poaching its employees and stealing trade secrets. Fitbit has said it has no knowledge of any such information in its possession.

In its latest complaint, Jawbone says it will also ask the U.S. International Trade Commission to investigate Fitbit, which could potentially lead to an import ban on Fitbit products.

Jawbone says it has hundreds of patents granted or pending, and claims that Fitbit infringes several of them. One patent describes a “general health and wellness management method and apparatus for a wellness application using data from a data-capable band.”

Another patent covers a “system for detecting, monitoring, and reporting an individual’s physiological or contextual status.”

Fitbit didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the latest suit.

The timing is bad for Fitbit, which is preparing to go public on the U.S. stock markets. It also faces intense competition from a number of rivals, which also include Garmin and Apple with its Apple Watch.

Both Jawbone and Fitbit make wearable bands and associated software that tracks people’s movement, exercise, sleep and heart rate.

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Apple To Acquire Embark

Apple is reportedly purchasing mapping app developer Embark, in a move that could lend more real-time navigation features for public transit to Apple’s own Maps app.

The acquisition, which was first reported by tech journalist Jessica Lessin, follows other recent mapping purchases for Apple: HopStop, another maker of apps for public transit directions; and Locationary, which provides data about local businesses; and WifiSLAM, an indoor location and mapping company.

Apple did not directly confirm its acquisition of Embark, but in an emailed statement said, “Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.”

Apple declined to comment further on the deal.

Apple has faced some serious challenges over the past year in providing a consistently solid mapping product with its Maps app. Last September Apple CEO Tim Cook was forced to publicly apologize for a series of issues plaguing the company’s Maps app in Apple’s iOS 6 operating system.

Embark is a company based in the San Francisco Bay Area that makes a mobile mapping app designed to help people navigate mass transit systems. The company’s app provides “tailored trips” specific to the user’s region, along with notifications for late-running trains and other advisories and closures.

Embark’s technology, if it does find its way into a future Apple product, could enhance Apple’s mapping products and make the company a stronger competitor to rivals like Google. Google’s Maps app already offers real-time public transit navigation features, as do some smaller players like iTransitBuddy.

Embark’s app is available for free on the iPhone for 10 transit systems including Boston’s MBTA, Chicago’s L, the New York City Subway and San Francisco’s Bart and Caltrain systems, with more on the way, according to Embark’s website.

It is not clear whether Embark’s app will be shut down as part of the acquisition. The app was still available in Apple’s App Store at the time of this article’s posting.

Embark’s team could not be immediately reached to comment on the deal.

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