A growing list of big name clients

AltaVista is best known as a search engine on the internet, but when the software was developed in 1995 in the research laboratories of Digital Equipment Corporation, it was originally intended for the company's corporate users. After Compaq's acquisition of Digital in 1999, AltaVista was sold to CMGI, the internet operating and development company.

"The software has been developed, not just for the internet space, but for licensing to third parties," says Mark Cuhaci, European vice president for AltaVista Search Software Group (AVSS). The company has been very active in licensing its software, says Mr Cuhaci, and the current version (AltaVista Search Engine 3.0) now has 1,300-1,400 corporate customers.

Among the licencees are Amazon.com, Ariba, Buy.com, DaimlerChrysler, Procter & Gamble, Reuters, Siemens, and Ticketmaster. "In the past, we have also been very successful in the internet space, where internet players have licensed the software to create a search service on the web," says Mr Cuhaci.

He believes that AltaVista has three unique facets compared to the rest of the enterprise search marketplace. "One is the virtually limitless scalability of the software," says Mr Cuhaci. He points out that the software has been used in extremely large implementations, not just in the company's major accounts, but also on the AltaVista website.

Another is the breadth of content. "We recognise virtually any database, as well as some 220-230 different file formats," says Mr Cuhaci.

The third area is the open architecture of the software, which provides a toolkit giving access to a number of different applications program interfaces (APIs). These enable other software to be linked to AltaVista.

One of those APIs is for the file converter, which allows third parties to integrate less well known file types into the AltaVista software. For voice recognition or optical character recognition (OCR), specialist technology can also be plugged into the file converter, enabling the information to be indexed and accessed.

"We've done in-house tests on scanning images," says Mr Cuhaci. "Words may exist in an image, and they can then be scanned and included in the index. We haven't designed the technology for either OCR or voice recognition, but we do provide the tools to integrate third-party technology."

There are two levels at which AltaVista works with third parties: "Ideally, we work together, not only in a marketing capacity, but also to build a connector giving direct access to content stored in their proprietary format," he explains. "There are other companies where we have started in a marketing capacity, and where there is work under way to give direct access to their content."

AltaVista has recently agreed to joint working relationships, at both levels, with a number of other IT companies such as ATG, Compaq, EMC, Hewlett-Packard, Open Market, Oracle, and Vignette.

In June, AltaVista announced the first two components of its new Enterprise Search Architecture: AV Enterprise Search and AV Personal Search. As well as having heightened security features, AV Enterprise Search allows users to specify search categories that are specific or relevant to them, under which the technology then classifies search results.

Facilities

"What won us most attention was the ability to index Exchange files as well," says Mr Cuhaci. AV Personal Search is intended for the individual user within a corporate. The user will be able to carry out a search over both personal hard drives and the data storage of the entire company.

Although, up to now, large corporations have been the users of AltaVista's enterprise search software, he acknowledges that smaller companies also have a need for the technology. "The challenge remains how to distribute it to that market efficiently," he admits, adding that in the US, AltaVista allows software downloads from its website.

"That's something we're exploring here in Europe," says Mr Cuhaci. "You can't have sales engineers going out and spending time on smaller implementations. Unfortunately, the economics don't work." The company is therefore considering addressing the SME market through third parties.

AltaVista's development plan includes making its software accessible from a wider range of devices, such as mobile phones. "Wireless Markup Language is currently supported in the enterprise space, and you can use the technology to index it," explains Mr Cuhaci. The company also intends to allow access from personal digital assistants, such as palm and hand-held computers.

Asked about the possible consolidation of the search industry, Mr Cuhaci is noncommittal. "Without naming players, I think it's a reasonable assumption that it will take place," he says.

While agreeing that third-party content and search engine integration remain important, Mr Cuhaci believes that scalability and relevance are the key areas. "What we've found in the marketplace is a number of companies that handle relevance or integration of third-party technologies very well, but then fall down on scalability," he maintains.

"We've run into others that do scalability quite well, but then fall down on open architecture, the ability to integrate third-party technologies, or to provide an open platform for custom development," says Mr Cuhaci. "AltaVista is a technology that can grow with a corporate environment, and at the same time have an open architecture to integrate third-parties. We believe this is the winning combination."