Microsoft Updates MSN ShoppingMicrosoft Updates MSN Shopping

With holiday shopping season fast approaching, Microsoft Corp. on Friday added comparison-shopping tools to its MSN portal.

The new features stem from collaboration with online shopping sites PriceGrabber.com and Shopping.com, officials with the Redmond, Wash., company said. The partnership has resulted in seven times the number of retailers and 35 times the number of products on MSN Shopping.

"I'm excited that MSN is now in the comparison shopping game -- we've built new, powerful tools to make it quick, easy and fun for shoppers to find what they are looking for from one of the largest selections available online," Jim Barr, general manager for MSN Shopping, said in a statement.

Microsoft also plans to include MSN Shopping results in product queries on MSN Search, the site's general search engine. The company said the capability would be added soon.