Convera Firstlight Online Tie Up
July 12, 2009
Convera’s financial results for the period ending April 30, 2009, came across the goose pond on June 12, 2009. The news release said that:
- Revenues decreased
- The company reported a net los of $5.4 million.
Following in the path of Lexalytics, Convera (once one of the big five in enterprise search) has merged with a European company. Same path followed by Attensity. The new company will take another run at the market. The mash up combines Convera and Firstlight Online Ltd. This tie up was announced early in June, before the financial results hit my desk. Convera will be delisted from public trading. The current CEO of Convera will become chairman of the new entity. The Firstlight CEO Colin Jeavons will run the combined company.
A recent recent positioning statement about Convera suggested that Convera was a developer of Web tools to allow publishers to crate customized search engines. Those with some mileage under their belt in search will recall that:
- Convera was Excalibur Technologies, which had some scanning, OCR, and search functions
- Excalibur bought ConQuest, a vendor with a search system
- Excalibur became Convera and entered into a search deal with Intel and the NBA.
After both the Intel and the NBA deals went south, Convera focused on rebuilding and invested some of Allen & Co.’s money in hardware to build vertical search systems. Convera sold its enterprise and government search businesses to Autonomy and Fast Search. The “new” Convera was to be a vertical search specialist. As you may know, Google gives away the functionality via its “custom search engine” program. Google also offers a “syndicated search” option as well.
The future of these tie ups could be bright. InQuira was formed from two search and content processing companies. That firm seems to have found a niche in customer support. The jury is still out on the Lexalytics / Infonic deal’s success.
Convera’s new angle will be online advertising and search. The story “Convera Corporation and Firstlight ERA to Create a new Search and Advertising Company for Publishing Market.” Convera Will Also Distribute Cash to Stockholders” in the Examiner said:
The combined new company will bring together the vertical search technology of Convera and the advertising sales and marketing capabilities of Firstlight. It will have over 60 corporate customer accounts and 120 existing Web sites with approximately 1500 advertisers. The new company will provide technology and advertising to the publishing market and expects to generate revenue from advertising sales and subscriptions.
In my opinion the trajectory from enterprise search to the Firstlight tie up underscores the lengths to which developers of search and content processing are willing to go to generate revenues. I remain skeptical of no cash tie ups or blending two organizations with different technical orientations. Search, gentle reader, is a tough business.
Stephen Arnold, July 12, 2009
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