kayak-logoKayak, the popular multi-airline airfare search engine, has stated that Microsoft Bing’s new travel search engine looks so much like its own that it’s confusing Kayak users. The travel search company sent Microsoft a legal letter last week telling them to cut it out.

bing-logoThere’s no question Bing feels like Kayak. When Microsoft showed us the search engine under embargo, this reporter’s first comment upon seeing the travel page demo’d was:

This looks like Kayak.

Kayak’s chief marketing officer Robert Birge said:

We have contacted them through official channels about concerns about the similarities between Bing and Kayak, from the look and feel of their travel product, they seem to agree with our approach to the market.

Microsoft’s Whitney Burk denies that there’s any copying going on.

We are discussing the matter with Kayak, Bing Travel is based on independent development by Microsoft and Farecast.com, which Microsoft acquired in 2008. Any contrary allegations are without merit.

Douglas Sims, the president of an IT consulting firm in Tennessee, noted the similarity too, inspiring him to write a short essay on his website:

Bing Travel is like Kayak in more ways than just the layout and visual design. The navigation, the automatic loading of results from different airlines (using ajax), even the results themselves are almost identical.

Sims said he had no connection to Kayak but was moved to write about the comparison because he was a longtime admirer of Kayak’s interface.

kayak_vs_bing2

Sims said:

I felt offended, I thought Kayak did an awesome job, and now my friends are giving credit to someone else.

Sims noted that Microsoft’s travel search engine includes the same shading on the gray sliding bars as Kayak’s site does.

Sims goes on saying:

I design stuff like this sometimes, I’ve always said I can’t just copy other people’s work, you can’t just rip it off, but in hindsight, is it fair game? Maybe I should do that.