Eric Schmidt of Google

Eric Schmidt, Larry Page and Sergey Brin of Google met in England this week to discuss Microsoft's congenial new relationship with Yahoo.

As a new twist to its ongoing acquisition drama, Microsoft may purchase Yahoo Search — as opposed to buying the whole company — which would effectively block any pending sponsored search relationship Google has with Yahoo.

But the Google triumvirate expressed little concern about the potential threat of "MicroHoo" in the search market, saidthe BBC.

Brin said Google earned its market leader position by delivering a superior product, as opposed to relying on the "strong-arm" tactics that are sometimes attributed to Microsoft in the software sector.

Not to say Google has been an industry saint. When Microsoft first proposed its Yahoo takeover bid, Google immediately contacted CEO Jerry Yang to derail the acquisition. It later formed a sponsored search "test partnership" with Yahoo, and enlisted Frank Quattrone for advice as the Yahoo/Microsoft merger talks grew more serious — odd behavior for a company that is confident about the superiority of its product.

But the company is currently at a loss for a defensive strategy against Microsoft's latest advance. "After this press conference the three of us will meet and decide what our response is," said Schmidt to UK journalists.