Ask.com Nabs Former Google Exec

January 22, 2008

Former Google executive Cesar Mascaraque has joined the Ask.com team on the position of European managing director, says vnunet. Calling Ask.com the “fastest growing search engine“, Mascaraque says it’s “an exciting time to join.” This new post won’t be all that different from his last job, though, since he was head of strategic partnerships and business development for southern Europe at Google.

We’ve seen a lot of high profile Googlers move elsewhere, but rarely to work at Google’s direct competitors (although it could be argue that Google competes with pretty much everyone). I bet the folks at Ask.com feel pretty good about “recruiting” ex-Googlers into their own camp, especially after the recent departure of their CEO, Jim Lanzone.