I don’t think Google has much of an advantage in this fight. Presumably, OpenAI will be able to partner with bing if they want.
Thanks to the antitrust suit, we know for sure that Google has been intentionally tanking search relevance in order to prop up their ad display numbers. I’m guessing none of the smaller search engines do that (since they all desperately want to grow their market share).
1. They're the incumbent with almost monopolistic market share. People aren't going to switch to a new product that's just roughly as good. It has to be way better.
2. Their search algorithm is straight up better than their next biggest competitor, Bing. The latter has tried for years to overtake google and failed.
3. They have copious amounts of user specific data across their products/services. That enables tailored AI responses.
You have a fair point about google propping up ad buyers. That is their Achilles heel.
5. Default deals with Apple, Samsung...
Here's an example asking perplexity something I've already researched a lot. I asked what's the best PC monitor for work. It cited several sites including Rtings and Forbes. It then told me the best was a Dell monitor based on the Forbes site. Rtings is definitely the better site for monitor reviews and didn't even rank that monitor as one of the best. I then asked Perplexity, what's the best website for pc monitor reviews. It responded Rtings was the best, listed a few others, and didn't even mention Forbes.