By using this site, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
Accept
SmartData CollectiveSmartData CollectiveSmartData Collective
  • Analytics
    AnalyticsShow More
    data-driven white label SEO
    Does Data Mining Really Help with White Label SEO?
    7 Min Read
    marketing analytics for hardware vendors
    IT Hardware Startups Turn to Data Analytics for Market Research
    9 Min Read
    big data and digital signage
    The Power of Big Data and Analytics in Digital Signage
    5 Min Read
    data analytics investing
    Data Analytics Boosts ROI of Investment Trusts
    9 Min Read
    football data collection and analytics
    Unleashing Victory: How Data Collection Is Revolutionizing Football Performance Analysis!
    4 Min Read
  • Big Data
  • BI
  • Exclusive
  • IT
  • Marketing
  • Software
Search
© 2008-23 SmartData Collective. All Rights Reserved.
Reading: Lucid Imagination
Share
Notification Show More
Aa
SmartData CollectiveSmartData Collective
Aa
Search
  • About
  • Help
  • Privacy
Follow US
© 2008-23 SmartData Collective. All Rights Reserved.
SmartData Collective > Uncategorized > Lucid Imagination
Uncategorized

Lucid Imagination

Daniel Tunkelang
Last updated: 2009/01/27 at 7:54 AM
Daniel Tunkelang
4 Min Read
SHARE

After the big news in the enterprise search space about Autonomy and FAST last week, the announcement of Lucid Imagination raising $6 million may seem anti-climatic. That’s nothing compared to the $775M Autonomy spent to acquire Interwoven, let along the $1.2B that Microsoft paid for FAST last year. And can Lucid Imagination really succeed as the Red Hat of enterprise search, making money by supporting open-source Lucene and Solr?

Perhaps. Lucene is certainly popular among folks looking for a free search engine. Moreover, for people who want to tinker with it, its being open source is a big plus.

But Lucene deployments require extensive customization. This is often the downside of open source, and the reason that industrial use open source software often involves a significant transfer of funds from enterprises to consultants. In contrast, closed-source solutions tend to come with more tooling, integration support, etc. Those are the sorts of details that don’t necessarily excite open-source developers but are crucial for enterprise software.

Will Lucid Imagination revolutionize the enterprise search market by providing low-cost services on top of free software? Perhap…

More Read

big data improves

3 Ways Big Data Improves Leadership Within Companies

IT Is Not Analytics. Here’s Why.
Romney Invokes Analytics in Rebuke of Trump
WEF Davos 2016: Top 100 CEO bloggers
In Memoriam: Robin Fray Carey

After the big news in the enterprise search space about Autonomy and FAST last week, the announcement of Lucid Imagination raising $6 million may seem anti-climatic. That’s nothing compared to the $775M Autonomy spent to acquire Interwoven, let along the $1.2B that Microsoft paid for FAST last year. And can Lucid Imagination really succeed as the Red Hat of enterprise search, making money by supporting open-source Lucene and Solr?

Perhaps. Lucene is certainly popular among folks looking for a free search engine. Moreover, for people who want to tinker with it, its being open source is a big plus.

But Lucene deployments require extensive customization. This is often the downside of open source, and the reason that industrial use open source software often involves a significant transfer of funds from enterprises to consultants. In contrast, closed-source solutions tend to come with more tooling, integration support, etc. Those are the sorts of details that don’t necessarily excite open-source developers but are crucial for enterprise software.

Will Lucid Imagination revolutionize the enterprise search market by providing low-cost services on top of free software? Perhaps, though I’m skeptical–and not just because they are a potential competitor to my employer. If they are to be more than a body shop, they’ll have to productize their customization efforts.  But I’d imagine that, if Lucid Imagination were to build such products, it would contribute them back into the Lucene code base. That might be great for customers, but it’s not clear how it translates into a sustainable revenue model.

It’s also worth noting that Lucid Imagination isn’t the first company pursuing this model. Sematext, founded in 2007, is another company implementing solutions on top of open source software, including Lucene. In fact, its founder, Otis Gospodnetic, is a regular at The Noisy Channel. Perhaps he can comment on the space.

Link to original post

Daniel Tunkelang January 27, 2009
Share This Article
Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn
Share

Follow us on Facebook

Latest News

sobm for ai-driven cybersecurity
Software Bill of Materials is Crucial for AI-Driven Cybersecurity
Security
IT budgeting for data-driven companies
IT Budgeting Practices for Data-Driven Companies
IT
machine,translation
Translating Artificial Intelligence: Learning to Speak Global Languages
Artificial Intelligence
data science upskilling
Upskilling for Emerging Industries Affected by Data Science
Big Data

Stay Connected

1.2k Followers Like
33.7k Followers Follow
222 Followers Pin

You Might also Like

big data improves
Big DataJobsKnowledge ManagementUncategorized

3 Ways Big Data Improves Leadership Within Companies

6 Min Read
Image
Uncategorized

IT Is Not Analytics. Here’s Why.

7 Min Read

Romney Invokes Analytics in Rebuke of Trump

4 Min Read

WEF Davos 2016: Top 100 CEO bloggers

14 Min Read

SmartData Collective is one of the largest & trusted community covering technical content about Big Data, BI, Cloud, Analytics, Artificial Intelligence, IoT & more.

AI and chatbots
Chatbots and SEO: How Can Chatbots Improve Your SEO Ranking?
Artificial Intelligence Chatbots Exclusive
ai in ecommerce
Artificial Intelligence for eCommerce: A Closer Look
Artificial Intelligence

Quick Link

  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy
Follow US
© 2008-23 SmartData Collective. All Rights Reserved.
Go to mobile version
Welcome Back!

Sign in to your account

Lost your password?