Five Years in Enterprise Search: 2011 to 2016
October 4, 2016
Before I shifted from worker bee to Kentucky dirt farmer, I attended a presentation in which a wizard from Findwise explained enterprise search in 2011. In my notes, I jotted down the companies the maven mentioned (love that alliteration) in his remarks:
- Attivio
- Autonomy
- Coveo
- Endeca
- Exalead
- Fabasoft
- IBM
- ISYS Search
- Microsoft
- Sinequa
- Vivisimo.
There were nodding heads as the guru listed the key functions of enterprise search systems in 2011. My notes contained these items:
- Federation model
- Indexing and connectivity
- Interface flexibility
- Management and analysis
- Mobile support
- Platform readiness
- Relevance model
- Security
- Semantics and text analytics
- Social and collaborative features
I recall that I was confused about the source of the information in the analysis. Then the murky family tree seemed important. Five years later, I am less interested in who sired what child than the interesting historical nuggets in this simple list and collection of pretty fuzzy and downright crazy characteristics of search. I am not too sure what “analysis” and “analytics” mean. The notion that an index is required is okay, but the blending of indexing and “connectivity” seems a wonky way of referencing file filters or a network connection. With the Harvard Business Review pointing out that collaboration is a bit of a problem, it is an interesting footnote to acknowledge that a buzzword can grow into a time sink.
There are some notable omissions; for example, open source search options do not appear in the list. That’s interesting because Attivio was at that time I heard poking its toe into open source search. IBM was a fan of Lucene five years ago. Today the IBM marketing machine beats the Watson drum, but inside the Big Blue system resides that free and open source Lucene. I assume that the gurus and the mavens working on this list ignored open source because what consulting revenue results from free stuff? What happened to Oracle? In 2011, Oracle still believed in Secure Enterprise Search only to recant with purchases of Endeca, InQuira, and Rightnow. There are other glitches in the list, but let’s move on.
Let’s take a look at this line up of companies again and make a note where these “brands” or “solutions” are today:
- Attivio. Still independent but pitching business intelligence, analytics, and Big Data. Search is a bit of a sideshow in 2016
- Autonomy. Sold to Hewlett Packard and sold again to Micro Focus. Bankers and lawyers seem to be the big winners of this hot potato.
- Coveo. Now pitching customer support as the customer support market chases bots. More repositioning likely.
- Endeca. Folded into Oracle and fading as a go to findability solution. Oracle needs to kill Amazon, not pump up the 1990s technology powering Endeca.
- Exalead. Absorbed into Dassault. Fading quick with key staff leaving and starting their own ventures.
- Fabasoft. Still chugging along as a solution to the Microsoft SharePoint search problem.
- Google. The Google Search Appliance was alive. Now it is dead and Google is pushing Springboard and a “new” search utility to locate content stored in Google’s cloud storage system.
- IBM. Now IBM is all in with the Watson thing. Watson is Lucene, acquired technology like Vivisimo minus its founders, and home brew code. The PR spend is focused on brand. Revenues may not be keeping pace with marketing.
- ISYS Search. Part of Lexmark’s brilliant attempt to escape the collapsing printer market by buying Brainware and ISYS Search. ISYS Search was shifted to a health care unit. The ISYS Search technology dates from the 1980s and seems to be disappointing its current owners who are busy trying to sell Lexmark to an outfit in China.
- Microsoft. Ah, Microsoft, the search giant. The news is that Fast Search & Transfer, the Powerset technology, the home brew code, Lucene, and bits and pieces providing search for the operating system are milestones which may be crumbling from time and weathering.
- Sinequa. Still alive and well. The company received an infusion of cash and is working to become a Big Data, analytics, semantic outfit.
- Vivisimo. IBM paid about $20 million for clustering and metasearch technology. In IBM’s hands, Vivisimo became a Big Data company. Perhaps that is one reason why the brand has disappeared into the Watson thing.
When I survey the enterprise search landscape in 2016, I see a revenue challenged group of survivors trying to survive in a southern soudanian zone.
The big success stories in enterprise search are companies who provide search and retrieval within a larger solution. In CyberOSINT: Next Generation Information Access (2015), I profile a number of search vendors who have found a way to survive and thrive.
The keys to success seem to be:
- Embedding search into solutions. Systems which provide actionable information; for example, maps, link analyses, and brief text reports. The laundry list approach to answers is a non starter for some successful firms.
- Shifting from selling search software to becoming a consulting firm. A good example of this is Search Technologies which emerged from the ashes of the Excalibur/Convera melt down.
- Selling out. The best example of throwing in the towel includes a remarkable number of “industry leading” and “cutting edge” firms. Fulcrum Technologies and Verity joined Autonomy, Endeca, Fast Search, and Vivisimo in shifting the job of making money from search to other outfits.
What happens to enterprise search vendors who cannot sell out, become advisers, or reposition? From my vantage point in rural Kentucky, there will be increasingly wild and crazy marketing gyrations. The senior managers will keep one eye open for signs of disaster and the other eye on job openings. In general, the aggressiveness of the outfits fighting to stay alive will increase. Thin skin, not a turtle shell, swathes the lucky folks pitching search and retrieval.
In short, the world depicted in 2011 has undergone significant change. A number of search vendors are in business if not thriving. These include Blossom Software, dtSearch, Maxxcat, and Yippy, among others. Why aren’t these enterprise search vendors better known?
The challenge for search vendors in 2016 boils down to marketing. Buzzwords, jargon, and optimism are not enough. Money, resources, and persistence are now more important than adding a nifty new but little understood and used feature.
Peak search arrived in 2003. A tough climb awaits those vendors who want to achieve great heights with findability.
Stephen E Arnold, October 4, 2016
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