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Open Source Firm Furthers Positive Image with Branding and Dedicated Staff

August 13th, 2012 | Posted by admin in branding | Business strategy | Information sources | Management | Open Source Search | search | Start ups - (0 Comments)

The open source software market has increasingly been the topic of  news and conversation due to the proliferation of innovative and customizable technologies stemming from it. As far as the Apache Lucene/Solr community goes, Lucid Imagination has not gone without their share of attention and neither will LucidWorks. Their new branding is discussed in “Lucid Imagination Changes Name to LucidWorks.”

This change recalls the name of their successful product line called LucidWorks. They now have a new product family called LucidWorks Product Suite. Moves were also made to reinforce commitment to open source developers by creating an online community for them at their new site, SearchHub.org.

The article offers insights from Paul Doscher, CEO of LucidWorks:

 “LucidWorks enables companies to build killer business-critical search applications that will access Big Data and enterprise content quickly and securely, while scaling to billions of data sets – without spending millions of dollars. The changes to our company name and product structure, along with the upcoming launch of SearchHub.org, enables us to address the unique needs of our open source and business communities.”

This is an exciting branding move for Lucid Imagination, but as far as we ’re concerned the name change is not what makes this company stand out at the moment. We have been very impressed with the fact that LucidWorks has a dedicated staff and an office. We can’t say the same for many other open source firms.

Megan Feil, August 13, 2012

Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext

IDC Releases Report Analyzing Lucid Imagination

July 23rd, 2012 | Posted by jasmine in Analysis | business model | Open Source Search | search - (0 Comments)

The IDC, a global provider of market intelligence for the information technology field, recently released the first of a series of reports analyzing open source search vendors. The company analyzed in the first report was Lucid Imagination, a commercial search vendor with strong venture backing, revenue growth, and a full-time professional open source search technology team. The IDC report presents new information plus an informed analysis of the LucidWorks’ technology.

The research and analysis for the report was conducted by several members of the IDC research team including Research Vice President Sue Feldman and Research Manager Dave Schubmehl as well as members of the ArnoldIT research team including Constance Ard and Dr. Tyra Oldham.

In order to provide a thorough analysis of the firm’s business model, the team of expert researchers interviewed principals of Lucid Imagination, conducted a technical analysis of the Lucid technology platform, and used a range of data analysis methods to pinpoint key information from open source content.

Stephen E Arnold, who contributed to the analysis, said:

The landscape of search has been reworked in the last 36 months. Proprietary technology vendors now find that open source search and content processing solutions have emerged as an alternative to the technology available from such companies as Autonomy (Hewlett Packard), Endeca (Oracle), Exalead Dassault Systèmes, Fast Search (Microsoft), InQuira (Oracle), and RightNow (Oracle). IDC’s research initiative in this area breaks new ground and sets the stage for deeper strategic analyses. Sue Feldman and her team are among the first of the blue chip consulting firms to put open source search in a business context.

This is just the first of a series of reports on open source search vendors. I’m looking forward to seeing what else IDC researchers have in store. For additional information about the for-fee report visit IDC’s “Get Doc” online service or visit the company’s Web site.

Jasmine Ashton, June 23, 2012

What’s in a (Domain) Name

May 29th, 2012 | Posted by jasmine in blogs | content marketing | search | Strategy - (1 Comments)

Shakespeare may have asked the question first, but it’s still relevant to a 21st century entrepreneur. Roger Dooley, writing for Neuromarketing, offers some tips to help counteract “domain bias” in his recent post “Does Your Domain Say ‘Trust Me’?” 

In the article, Dooley discusses recent research conducted by Stanford University in partnership with Microsoft on whether the domain of top-ranked search results influences whether the searcher will click on that link:

“One of the comparisons performed by the researchers was to label search results as being from webmd.com, a popular and trusted health site, or genetichealth.com, an unfamiliar site. By presenting the search results labeled with these domains with alternating snippets and positions, the effect of the domain could be tested. Results that appeared to be from webmd.com got clicked more often, even when the actual content of the search title/snippet was switched with the lesser-known domain.”

Unfortunately, with the new metrics and algorithm employed by Google, recognizability is self-reinforcing. If consumers follow a link because they’ve heard of the domain, that link will get more clinks and rise in the search result rankings. It leaves little room to establish credibility for a new venture.

Dooley warns against building microsites with unfamiliar domain names connected to your main site. Instead, work on building your ranking and display information so that your site can get the clicks and grow into one that consumers recognize and trust.

Laura Abrahamsen May 29, 2012

Inforbix to Present at Upcoming Semantic Technology Conference

May 21st, 2012 | Posted by jasmine in conference | search | Start ups - (0 Comments)

Inforbix, a Boston based software company that was founded in 2010, will be participating in the Semantic Tech & Business Conference (SemTechBiz) in San Francisco June 3-7. The tech company will be presenting on how it deploys semantic technology to help solve the growing data challenge for manufacturing industries in a new and unique way.

Oleg Shilovitsky, CEO of Inforbix, said of the conference:

“We are excited to present how Inforbix deploys semantic technology to solve some of the most challenging engineering data problems at this year’s SemTechBiz conference. The demands of design and engineering data consumption in manufacturing organizations have surpassed the ability of most users to manage and control their data. Inforbix is changing and improving how people in those firms interact with their data.”

On June 5, Shilovitsky will be participating in a Start-Up competition by presenting on how to solve the problem of engineering data complexity. This should be a very interesting presentation and I hope those in the San Francisco area get a chance to check it out.

Jasmine Ashton, May 21, 2012

OpenSearchNewsDelves Deep Into Open Source Search Products and Information

April 16th, 2012 | Posted by admin in Business strategy | News | search | Technology | vertical markets - (0 Comments)

Open source software and cloud-based services continue to propel businesses into the twenty-first century. For the last 25 years or so, the open source community has been thriving. As there are no signs of this movement slowing, ArnoldIT has released a new information service called OpenSearchNews.

Similar to other services offered by ArnoldIT such as Beyond Search, OpenSearchNews tracks the evolution of any industry related news offering critical commentary and pointing readers in the direction of other credible sources of information. The free service publishes Monday through Friday.
Emily Aldridge, the information service’s editor explains in the press release announcing the service :
“Open source search has become a fast-growing segment of the enterprise search and big data markets. The number of companies competing in this segment is growing. The phenomenon is global with solutions available from Canada, the Danish Library, and entrepreneurs in the Russia. We are reporting on the companies, trends, and products which offer an alternative to the seven figure solutions from proprietary enterprise search solutions.”
Business-minded professionals will be sure to benefit from the wealth of information on open source products OpenSearchNews provides. Discerning fact from fiction often proves difficult amid the massive amount of marketing jargon used to pump up products from some vendors. We expect to see this new information service land above such convoluted language.
Megan Feil, April 16, 2012