AT&T Brings Yahoo! Search to Every Handset (Except the iPhone)

Yahoo! and AT&T today announced the move to make Yahoo! the default search engine on AT&T cell phones.

Starting today all web-enabled AT&T handsets will allow customers the option of using Yahoo!’s oneSearch search engine while surfing the web on the go.

“Our customers want mobile search to be convenient and intuitive, and Yahoo! oneSearch is an important step for us in delivering that level of experience to them,” said Michael Bowling, vice president of Converged Services, AT&T.

While it’s good news for Yahoo!, it’s not as great as it seems. AT&T has been in the news almost constantly over the last two years and a partnership with a company that’s receiving so much coverage almost definitely falls under the “any publicity is good publicity” umbrella. However, it’s rather unfortunate for the search engine that most of the AT&T news out there over the last couple of years has been directly related to the iPhone, which happens to be the only AT&T handset Yahoo! won’t be appearing on.

The deal is very much Yahoo!’s bag as opposed to AT&T. Not only is the company launching oneSearch on the U.S. telecommunications company but it has also signed deals with as many as 60 carriers worldwide.

According to Reuters, rival search engine Google is in talks with Verizon wireless (currently second to AT&T in the U.S. market) to become the default web search application on its handsets.