Cocktail provides "intelligent caching," which is what allows Axis to serve up so many images without significant delay, Batraski said.

Yahoo into a search partnership with Microsoft in 2010 in which it outsourced the back end of its search system to Microsoft. Yahoo has continued to work on the front end of the search experience, although it has struggled to retain its 14 percent market share, according to comScore data. Axis will tweak the search algorithm based on which results prove most useful for its users.

Axis is debuting with keyword and image searches only. Search results do not yet include advertisements. The app is currently available for iPhone and iPad. An Android app will launch "soon," Batraski said.

The IDG News Service