News International has made a multi-million pound investment in a new property search engine in spite of already owning half of Propertyfinder.

Globrix, an unlisted company, said it received funding for an advertising drive next year with reserves for its second and third years as it tries to establish a new search engine modelled on a news aggregation business.

“Estate agents want to get as many eyeballs as possible on their properties and we believe we can get that.”

Agents would have to opt out from having their listings included on the site, which will use “spider” search engine technology to guide customers to properties that fit their criteria.

News International, which owns 50 per cent of Propertyfinder with an Australian partner, declined to comment on the deal and neither party was prepared to say how much money was involved.

It is believed the company, which publishes The Sun, The Times and their Sunday sister papers, hopes the new search engine will complement its existing holding.

One industry analyst said: “Barriers to entry in this market are pretty high and it is not clear that estate agents would welcome this kind of approach.

Nov 1, 2007