Who Is Who in the Chase for US Govt Information Work
August 26, 2009
I was poking around for information on the Teradata technology and I read “An Important Benchmark for Federal Knowledge Management”. The most important items in the write up were this check list of vendors chasing Federal projects. Here’s the list, “Cognos [now IBM], Business Objects [now SAP], MicroStrategy Autonomy, Blackboard, Vivisimo [a search vendor], Hummingbird [a unit of Open Text], Informatica, Tomoye [social software], Concept Searching, Elsevier [sci tech publisher], SER [Brainware?], Interwoven [now Autonomy], Fig Leaf Software [training company], Mark Logic, TIBCO [plumbing and infrastructure], Vignette [now Open Text], Convera, Factiva [now Dow Jones], Inxight [same as Business Objects now], Ascential, First Logic, Stratify, MetaCarta [mapping with In-Q-Tel backing], Trillium, Hyperion, Teradata, [and] Attensity.” Several of the names surprised me. For example, Covera. Another was Concept Searching, a company not in my files. Quite a list for a knowledge centric conference. Seems redundant and out of date yet the article published on BeyeNetwork has an August 18, 2009, date stamp. Explicit, accurate company identification is useful to me. Dr. Ramon Barquin and BeyeNetwork may have an alternative view.
Stephen Arnold, August 26, 2009
Morphing Search Vendor Adventures: Customer Feedback
August 13, 2009
Quite a few search and content processing companies are chasing the supposed honey pot of customer support, customer feedback, customer self help, and just about any way to cut these costs. Forbes ran a cheerleading article that I was going to ignore. “No,” one of the goslings said, “This write up makes some good points.” Okay, the story is “The Upside of Bad Online Customer Reviews” by Mirela Iverac. The core idea is that customers who complain can provide useful information to the company that caused the dust up in the first place. The underlying technical hook is that the outfit mentioned in the story, based on what I have heard, uses the Attensity system to deliver the bag of goodies. If you revel in feedback loops that work, snag the Forbes’s write up.
Stephen Arnold, August 13, 2009
Autonomy Enters Search Engine Marketing
August 4, 2009
Search has become a commodity. Every SharePoint installation includes search. Content management systems have been struggling to bridge the gaps that exist among Web page output, eDiscovery, and repurposing of information for print. Search vendors have had to scramble to make sales as open source solutions like Lemur Consulting’s FLAX, lower cost solutions such as Gaviri, and marketing centric such as those introduced by Attensity have flowed into the marketplace.
Autonomy has been among the most agile search vendors I track. The company diversified into rich media before most organizations knew that video could be digitized. Then the company hopped into print-to-digital services with some key acquisitions. Most recently, Autonomy added to its Zantaz services with its acquisition of Interwoven, a content management company.
The most recent Autonomy innovation is a landing page service. The idea is that an organization buys a Google AdWord. The user clicking on the AdWord will be sent to the page that provides information referenced or promised in the ad. That page is a landing page and most content management systems don’t produce these without cartwheels, fireworks, and a brass band. In short, Autonomy’s announcement about a “hosted Web landing page” indicates that Autonomy is moving quickly again. The key for me is the word “hosted”. Autonomy is becoming a cloud-services company. Maybe the word “utility” is appropriate? I think landing pages are a new service for a search vendor. This is not a bad thing, just not a search thing. In my opinion, the market for one-size-fits all search seems to be softening.
Stephen Arnold, August 4, 2009
Microsoft Fast Posts Voice of the Customer Videos
August 4, 2009
I had not visited Microsoft’s enterprise search Web site for a month, maybe longer. I noted today (August 3, 2009) that Microsoft has added some videos that explain how Microsoft Fast Enterpriser Search Platform can perform “voice of the customer” functions. “Voice of the customer” is a buzzword that carries a wagon load of meanings. I think of “voice of the customer” as straddling customer service and self-service Web sites. Quite a few search vendors have abandoned the giant “one size fits all” type of sale that once was the basic approach of a search sales person. Now, search vendors are targeting. Attensity (once a darling of the intelligence community) has jumped into customer support and market intelligence. Other vendors are taking smaller findability problems and focusing on making a focused sale. The “boil the ocean” approach is a tough sale in today’s economic climate. You can locate the line up of videos on the Enterprise Search Web site. Happy customers include Seek, Accenture, Reed (part of Elsevier), Verizon, NEC, and Orion Pharmaceutical. What is clear to this addled goose is that Microsoft is attacking the enterprise search market with similarly small-scale, precision “packages” of search and content processing. I have no doubt that Microsoft can sell more sharply defined products. The strategy seems to be a shift away from the broad statements about Microsoft Fast technology’s ability to slice, dice, chop, and grate. The new approach strikes me as more workable, maybe more believable. Since the new version of Fast ESP is not in the channel at this time, the addled goose will have to wait and see what ships.
Stephen Arnold, August 4, 2009
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
Autonomy Expands into Marketing
May 17, 2009
Attensity has been moving into marketing and marketing-related search applications. Autonomy has offered tools that provide insights into market behavior announced at the eMetrics Marketing Optimization Summit a deal that indicates Autonomy is serious about this application of its search technology. Autonomy announced that the Optimost Adaptive Targeting is now powered by Autonomy’s Meaning Based Marketing engine. Autonomy is showing agility in its leveraging of its Interwoven acquisition. The company said here:
Optimost Adaptive Targeting mines all major types of customer attributes to create customer segments, including context (how the visitor arrives at the Website, e.g. search keyword), geography, time of day, and demographic, behavior, and account profile information. Once customer segments are created, multivariate tests are conducted on an unlimited number of copy ideas, offers, and layouts to determine the best solution for each audience segment. By adding the Meaning Based Computing capabilities of IDOL to Adaptive Targeting, marketers gain a unique ability to understand and effectively serve their customers. By leveraging IDOL, Optimost Adaptive Targeting now includes unique keyword clustering capabilities that automatically identifies
concepts and patterns as they are emerging on the web. For instance, an online pet store might discover that an unusually high number of “long-tail” searches relate to vacationing with pets. The solution could then automatically serve up more content and special offers around travel tote bags and kits.
The addled goose predicts that other vendors of search and content processing technology will increase their efforts to blend search and content processing with online and traditional marketing functions. Google is active in online marketing, and could increase its presence in this sector quickly and without warning. A stampede may be forming on the search prairie.
Stephen Arnold, May 17, 2009
Search 2010: Five Game Changers
May 7, 2009
Editor’s Note: This is the outline of Stephen Arnold’s comments at the “debate”session of the Boye 09 Conference in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on May 6, 2009. The actual talk will be informal, and these notes are part of the preparation for that talk.
Introduction
Thank you for inviting me to share my ideas with you. I remember that WC Fields had a love hate relationship with Philadelphia. Approaching the Curtis Building, where we are meeting, I realized that much of the old way of doing business has changed. I don’t have time to dig too deeply into the many content challenges organizations face. If the publisher of the Saturday Evening Post were with us this afternoon, I think Mr. Curtis would have a difficult time explaining why his successful business was marginalized; that is, pushed aside, made into an artifact like the Liberty Bell down the street.
I have been asked to do a “Search 2010” talk twice this year. Predicting the future in today’s troubled economic environment is difficult. Nevertheless, I want to identify five trends in the next 20 minutes. I will try to take a position on each trend to challenge the panelists’ thinking and stimulate questions from you in the audience.
Let’s dive right in. Here are the five trends:
- Darwinism and search
- Real time search
- Google’s enterprise push
- Microsoft’s enterprise search
- Open source
I want to comment on each, offer a couple of examples, and try to come at these subjects in a way that highlights what my research for Google: The Digital Gutenberg revealed as substantive actions in search.
Search and Darwin
The search sector is in a terrible position. The term “search” has been devalued. Few people know what the word means, yet most people say, “I am pretty good at search.” That confidence is an illusion. The search sector is a tough nut to crack. Well known companies such as Mondosoft and Ontolica found themselves purchased by an entrepreneur. That company restructured, and now the “old” Mondosoft has been reincarnated but it is not clear that the new owners will make a success of the business. Delphes, a specialist vendor in Québec, failed. Attensity orchestrated a roll up with two German firms to become more of a force in marketing. A promising system in the Netherlands called Teezir was closed when I visited the office in November 2009. I hear rumors about search vendors who are chasing funding frequently, but I don’t want to mention the names of some of these well known firms in this forum. Not long ago, the high profile Endeca sought support in the form of investments from Intel and SAP’s venture arm. At Oracle, the Secure Enterpriser Search 10g product has largely disappeared. The strong survive, which means big players like Google and Microsoft are going to fighting for the available revenue.
Real Time Search
What is it? The first thing to say is that real time search is a terrible phrase. Riches await the person who crafts a more appropriate buzzword. The notion is that messages from a service like Twitter fly around in their 140 character glory. The Twitter search system at http://search.twitter.com or the developers who use the Twitter API make it easy to find or see information. A good example is the service at http://www.twitturly.com or http://www.tweetmeme.com. You look at Tweets (the name for Twitter messages) and you scan the listings on these services. Real time search blends geospatial and mobile operations. Push, not key word search, complements scanning a list of suggested hits. The mode of user interaction is not keyword search. This is an important distinction.
“Search” means look at or scan. “Search” does not mean type key words and hunt through results list. It is possible to send a Tweet to everyone on Twitter or to those who follow you and ask a question. You may get an answer, but the point is that the word “search” does not explain the value of this type of system for business intelligence or marketing, for example. If you run a search with the keyword of a company like Google or Yahoo, you can get information which may or may not be accurate or useful. You will see what’s happening “now”, which is the meaning of “real time”.
Semantic Roll Up: The Effect of Financial Compression
April 21, 2009
A flurry of emails arrived today about the tie up among several companies with good reputations but profiles that are lower than those enjoyed by Autonomy and Endeca. You can read the official news announcement here about the deal among Attensity, Empolis GmbH, and Living-e AG. The conflation is called The Attensity Group. Here’s a snapshot of each company based on the information I ratted out of my files in the midst of new carpet, painting, and hanging new boxer dog pictures:
- Attensity. Deep text processing. Started in the intel community. Probed marketing. Acted as ring master for the tie up.
- Empolis GmbH. (Link was dead when I checked it on April 20, 2009.) A distribution and archiving system and file based content transformation. Orphaned after parent Bertelsmann faced up to the realities facing the dead tree crowd. Now positions itself in knowledge management.
- Living-e AG. Provides software products that enable efficient information exchange. Web content management, behavior analysis. Founded in 2003 as WebEdition Software GmbH.
The news release refers to the deal as a “market powerhouse”. This is the type of phrase that gets me to push the goslings to the computer terminals to do some company monitoring.
It’s too early for me to make a call about the product line up the company will offer. Should be interesting. Some pundits will make an attempt to presage the future. Not this silly goose. The customers will decide, not the mavens.
Stephen Arnold, April 21, 2009
AMI Update
January 28, 2009
I was updating my search files in the wake of the SurfRay situation. My original January 18, 2009, post is here. After the post appeared an AMI professional called me last week saying, “We are in business. I will send you information.” That was January 20, 2009. Today (January 28, 2009) the goose was greeted with an ice storm and a request to write a new post about my questioning Web log post about a company in my files under my file name of Ami Software with links to GoAmi, Albert, and Ami Software. You must read my original post here. I tried to call the firm one time January 16, 2009, but the phone went unanswered, an unusual event I recall the AMI UK representative suggesting to me a day after the post appeared. AMI wants me to set the record in line with the company’s current status. Here are the inputs I received this morning (January 28, 2009), almost 10 days after my request for information on January 18, 2009:
Currently your article ranks No 5 in Google under the search AMI Software, I’m not confident about your comments regarding how things get lost in WordPress, particularly as we are all in the advanced information retrieval business. So far I have taken two calls on this, one from an investor and one from a Journalist at Information World Review. Fortunately I know both these people personally and have been able to manage it but can I, as politely as possible, suggest that given the inaccuracy and very negative suggestive innuendo of your piece that it is in nobody’s interest, not yours or ours, for it to be out there at all. If you’ve made a mistake you need to put it right and quickly, I’m trying to work with you to give that opportunity. Steve, I’d really prefer to resolve this and be in a position to meet up on your next trip to the UK for lunch, you may be interested in some of the things our customers are doing with AMI, However if this matter is not dealt with promptly and properly, I will have to make moves next week to publicly counter your comments and distance ourselves from this. Please call me if you have any questions, I assure you that the spirit of things here is always one of amiable co-operation.
The other message I received on January 27, 2009, was: this. The italics show text from my Web write up.
I wanted to update you and correct elements of the profile you have published recently on your Beyond Search site about AMI Software. I am taking the opportunity to write to you privately in the first instance and hope that we can agree an accurate update and move forwards.
From your recent entry:
“I have been updating my files. I was looking for search vendors who had dealings with the UK Ministry of Defence. That organization had some email trouble, and I was curious from which vendor the MoD was licensing software. My files contained a reference to Ami Software, a company based in France when I last looked at the system in 2007.”
If I read it correctly the indication is that the UK Ministry of Defence has been having trouble with their e-mail and, somewhere, AMI may be associated with that. This is ludicrous. I will check but to my knowledge we have never claimed to work specifically with the UK Ministry of Defence. As I’m sure you’ll appreciate each European country has its own Ministry of Defence amongst which we definitely do have very long standing customers, not however the UK Ministry of Defence.
“The release includes “knowledge modelling [sic]”
If the [sic] relates to the phrase “Knowledge Modelling” then this is simply the way an increasing number of our customers refer to the subject. If it is with regards to the spelling “modelling” can I point out that this spelling is in fact perfectly ok? I believe in the US you prefer “modeling”.
“In France the company does business as Albert France SA. In the UK, it is Albert UK. In North America, the company works with Propelion Internet Solutions Inc”
The registered company is GoAlbert SA trading as AMI Software. All commercially activities are conducted under the name AMI Software. The company’s core technology is called the Automatic Meaning Interpreter™ (AMI) and AMI is how our customers refer to us.
“Functions are accessed via htpp services” (http)
“and Mike Alderton as UK sales manager.” I am the General Manager; our Sales Manager is Theresa Farrell. (I’m not someone particularly concerned about titles, but just in terms of accuracy..)
“What’s peculiar is that information about the company seems to have tapered off by October 2008, and I can’t determine if the search and content processing company is still open for business. With the problems at such companies as Lycos and SurfRay on my mind, I am curious. If anyone has information about the status of this company, please, use the comments section of the Web log to post the information”
This statement could harm the company and its investors and I’d like to update you.
Just to summarise in brief….
In 2008 AMI has achieved a record year of revenue growth and new customer signings; in effect in the last year the company has almost doubled in size and is profitable at a better than market average % rate. We have very high levels of customer satisfaction and indeed, if you’d find it useful, I’d be more than pleased to arrange for you to speak directly with our customers.
We are one of the few companies in our sector that is currently recruiting for new hires in Sales and Engineering. In the UK we have recently moved to larger offices and I would be very happy to welcome you here in Cambridge (UK) or Paris or Montpellier at anytime.
I’d like to call you to make sure you’re happy with this update and, if useful, send you some further information about us and our products.
I am a bit fuzzy on the company name. I don’t have nitty gritty detail about the current version’s most recent features. If I get some substantive data, I will post a summary.
If anyone can post an update about the urls and names, let me know. I have added this company to my active watch.
Alas, I have no plans to visit the UK any time soon. News releases and phones numbers that point to a line answered by a human are somewhat useful to me. Fast response to my queries is helpful. The addled goose waddles in a purposeful manner.
You know what I know. Sounds like the firm is doing well. Check out the company’s software offerings.
With search vendors repositioning and shifting to new business models, I will have lots of questions. Now I am curious about Attensity’s open source initiative. That’s my current topic.
Stephen Arnold, January 28, 2009
Cognos 8: Blurring Business Intelligence and Search
October 4, 2008
The death of enterprise search and the wobblies pulling down content management systems (CMS) are not well understood by licensees–yet. In the months going forward, the growing financial challenges in North America and Western Europe will take a toll on spending for information technology. The strong interest (based on my analysis of the clicks on the articles on this Web site) suggest that some folks are thinking hard about the utility of open source search systems and lower-cost alternatives to the seven figure price tags on some of the high profile search systems. I can’t mention these firms by name. My attorney is no fun at all. You can identify these vendors by going to almost any Web search system and keying the phrase “enterprise search” or “information access”. You can figure out the rest of the information from these results pages.
IBM baffles me. The company offers more information products and services than any other firm I track. Each year I try to sort out the product and service names. This year I noticed this information buried deep in one of the news stories about the new version of Cognos 8. My source is here,
My hunch is that IBM is creating a new map for business intelligence. On that map, IBM will point out the big X where the real high value payoff may be found. Here’s the pertinent passage from the IBM Cognos news release:
IBM’s recent CEO and CIO surveys have found unstructured corporate information such as user files, customer comments, medical images, Web and rich media content to be growing at 63%. The explosive growth of this type of business information has pushed the convergence of the BI and Search categories. It has created demand for new BI search capabilities to provide quick and easy access to both ranked and relevant BI content and unstructured information. Newly updated, IBM Cognos 8 Go! Search v4 lets any business user extend the decision-making capabilities of IBM Cognos 8 BI by securely accessing and dynamically creating BI content using simple key-word search criteria. The software works with popular enterprise search applications such as IBM OmniFind Enterprise Edition, Google, Yahoo and Autonomy so users can see structured, trusted BI content and unstructured data such as Word documents and PDF’s in the same view within a familiar interface. Users can search all fully-indexed metadata as well as titles and descriptions within a report. Search-assisted authoring and exploration gives them options to refine queries or analyze data cubes based on search terms. These capabilities speed access to the most relevant business information regardless of naming similarities between reports, helps business users quickly refine queries as required and frees IT from constantly re-creating commonly used reports. This leaves IT with more time for strategic business initiatives. The software is completely integrated with the web-based administration and security parameters set by IT administrators for IBM Cognos 8 BI. This integration provides a centralized, efficient approach to administration and security and effectively addresses two common areas of concern for resource-constrained IT departments, who want to provide more autonomy to business users, but need a single administration point and assurance that corporate authentication policies will be maintained. ‘These new enhancements to our Go! Portfolio provide business-driven performance information to help each area of the organization strategically manage the information that is most pertinent to them,’ said Leah MacMillan, vice president, product marketing, Cognos, an IBM Company. ‘Both the business and IT gain more autonomy whether employees are in the office searching, monitoring and analyzing business outcomes or on the road looking for new business updates or geographically relevant information.’ The IBM Cognos 8 Go! Portfolio of software is a key component of IBM’s Information Agenda, a new approach consisting of industry-specific software and consulting services geared to helping customers use information as a strategic asset across their businesses. [Emphasis added]
Let me deconstruct this passage using my addled goose methods.
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