A new rival to search engine Google has been launched that its creators believe can offer better search engine placement than the web giant.

Cuil, pronounced 'cool', is the brainchild of a former Google employee and boasts additional search tools including subject tabs and search refining suggestions for users.

Anna Patterson, formerly of Google, and her husband Tom Costello, claim that the new Cuil search engine has already indexed more web pages than its competitor.

Google lays claim to having found around one trillion unique web pages, but an updated index number is unknown.

Cuil has allegedly indexed 120 billion pages, which could improve its capabilities of recognising search engine optimisation (SEO) efforts of businesses.

Tom Costello, CEO and co-founder of the new search engine, said: "Our significant breakthroughs in search technology have enabled us to index much more of the internet, placing nearly the entire Web at the fingertips of every user.

"In addition, Cuil presents searchers with content-based results, not just popular ones, providing different and more insightful answers that illustrate the vastness and the variety of the Web."

Could the focus on content rather than popularity compete with Google?

Business Feet deliver targeted results through search engine optimisation