Although its reputation is far less well-known than that of Internet search engines such as Google and Yahoo, enterprise search is more relevant and intelligent than the current Internet search. With the increasing scale of the global enterprise search market, will there be a second enterprise Google focusing on enterprise search?
Three months ago, Baidu, which ranked first in China's Internet search market, suddenly announced the cancellation of its enterprise software department. Baidu, which has more than 50 employees and focuses on enterprise-level search, is said to have been dissolved in only four hours.
Once the news was announced, Baidu was immediately pushed to the forefront of public opinion by the media, and the war of words between Baidu and Sohu was heated up for a time.
Three months later, these laid-off workers were absorbed by a company called Sunshine Huibo. The reporter learned from Sunshine Huibo that former Baidu employees who joined Sunshine Huibo are using their accumulated experience and resources to help the company quickly open the China market.
The market size is just the tip of the iceberg.
Submit a strange picture, and then the search engine can tell you the author, theme and other information of this picture; By submitting a keyword, the search engine can roughly understand your specific search needs and provide the results you want. These are all good search experiences that enterprise search can bring to users at present.
Although its popularity is far less than that of Internet search engines such as Google and Yahoo, at present, Sunshine Huibo, a listed company from London, England, completed the acquisition of Verity, another enterprise search company, for US$ 500 million in June last year, and its share in the enterprise search market has soared to 80% (according to Gartner's statistics), far exceeding the second-ranked manufacturers such as Microsoft, Google, Oracle Bone Inscriptions and IBM.
In China, TRS and Tianyu, which have been focusing on enterprise search for more than ten years, have accumulated a lot of experience in the domestic enterprise market and independently developed their own search technology, although their fame is not as good as Baidu's.
Just like an iceberg floating on the sea, the content of enterprises on the Internet only shows the tip of the iceberg. Gartner's research report shows that the total amount of data in enterprises far exceeds the total amount of information on the Internet: the information published by enterprises on the Internet only accounts for 1% ~ 2% of the information, and more than 98% of the information is stored in enterprises.
The search methods in enterprises are quite different from those in the Internet. In enterprises, digital information closely related to people, such as text files, e-mails, audio and video files, occupies a dominant position, and its share has exceeded 80%. And this information is scattered in every corner of the computer system in the enterprise in an unstructured form.
Therefore, how to conveniently, quickly and safely obtain the internal information content of enterprises has become the mission of enterprise search engines.
Compared with Internet search engines, enterprise search products pose greater challenges to core technologies. It not only requires faster search speed and more accurate results, but also requires indexing a large number of documents and different types of media. At the same time, it also requires convenient deployment, which can be combined with the existing information system, knowledge base or BI (business intelligence) system of the enterprise, paying more attention to security and privacy.
Users who have used Microsoft Windows desktop search tool know that this tool can retrieve unstructured information from users' computers by keywords, time, etc. Enterprise search tool is equivalent to an upgraded version of desktop search. The difference is that enterprise-level search faces the network and database of the whole enterprise, and the search environment is more complicated than a computer. If desktop search is an ordinary household camera, then enterprise search is a professional camera with lenses and complete functions.
Just a few years ago, for search users, the interface of enterprise search was no different from Google and Yahoo websites on the Internet: it was just a search text box on the company intranet. Enter keywords above, and you can find relevant information on the enterprise website.
However, if your knowledge still stays here today, it will be out of date. Search technology has entered a new development stage along the intelligent and semantic route. Hadley Reynolds, an analyst at Delphi Group, once said: "The current search technology has formed a huge technical category, from simple keyword search to taxonomic classification to text analysis."
In China, most key cities' libraries, archives, government agencies and news systems have introduced the application of enterprise-level search, and many enterprises in finance, telecommunications, automobile, manufacturing and other industries have also begun to embed enterprise-level search engines in OA systems, and at the same time deploy information intelligent analysis systems aimed at the competitive environment of enterprises. In addition, some large e-commerce websites have begun to use enterprise-level search technology to meet the increasingly detailed needs of customers.
In foreign countries, enterprise-level search technology is showing a continuous and in-depth application trend. Almost all Fortune 500 companies have the demand and application of enterprise-level search. From the BBC to the US Department of Homeland Security, corporate search covers everything.
In the research report on the global software market, the research company Ovum Report pointed out that the internal search demand of enterprises is similar to that of Google and Yahoo, showing an upward trend. By 2006, the global market scale of enterprise search technology will increase by 288%, reaching $65.438+05.480+03 billion. Experts predict that the China market will become the latest growth point in the world.
The giants have long been unable to hold back.
Seeing the potential huge market, the giants also actively joined in. These VIP players are Google, Microsoft, IBM and Oracle Bone Inscriptions.
Google started offering enterprise search products four years ago, and recently its Google Mini and Search Appliance have been upgraded. On August 28th, a software package specially developed for the business sector was released, including the functions of searching e-mail, calendar, chat history and so on. Although Google has released several search tools for small business users, such as Google Mini, Dave Girouard, vice president of Google's enterprise search department, still calls it "an icebreaker for Google to serve enterprise users".
But Microsoft is dismissive of Google's actions in enterprise search.
"No one can steal profits from Microsoft's site, and we will not share a rice bowl with others." Kevin turner, the chief operating officer of Microsoft, said quietly at the 7,000-person business partner meeting held by Microsoft. This honest and frank leader just joined Microsoft from Wal-Mart 1 1 a few months ago. In a few appearances, Kevin showed his determination to win the enterprise search market.
Analysts pointed out that Google mainly relies on consumers' high awareness of its brand to slowly penetrate into the enterprise search market. But at present, it can't be said that the effect is ideal, and like other peripheral products of Google, it is still in the trial stage and has not yet been finalized. At present, the main reason why Google insists on doing enterprise search is to develop its enterprise IT technology suppliers, maintain its competitiveness against traditional giants such as Microsoft, and focus on the overall competition pattern in the future.
Microsoft, which wants to make efforts in the enterprise market more and more, has incorporated enterprise search products into its latest strategy "People Ready".
According to Xiong Mingfeng, technical consultant of Microsoft China Professional Solutions Department, Microsoft's enterprise search is going beyond the existing function, that is, only creating files. The new software solution makes use of the rich resources of clients and servers, such as Windows Desktop Search and Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007. By using these new solutions, people will be able to get the information they need most in time, whether on the desktop, on the server or in the whole company-as long as they use a simple, intuitive and familiar user interface.
It is reported that Microsoft has successfully signed 35 partners. The investment in Vista, Office 2007 and CRM projects will reach $20 billion, so expanding the enterprise search market will undoubtedly increase this number.
According to IDC data, after 20 years of efforts, Microsoft has become the second place in the enterprise search market, second only to Sunshine Huibo.
Microsoft made a move, and IBM will never wait. Under the pressure of competition, Blue Giant recently launched a combination boxing: it released OmniFind, an enterprise-level search tool, and acquired FileNet, a data transmission company, at a price of $65.438+$60 million, aiming at improving the efficiency and quality of enterprise search solutions.
IBM related people told reporters that IBM's OmniFind software has the ability to query different types of data sources and return results immediately. It can search various data sources and collect metadata. It can provide various search functions such as field search and parameter search, and support multi-level enterprise-level search security. Moreover, IBM China Development Center also has strong technical support for enterprise-level search.
After completing the acquisition of TripleHop last year, Oracle Bone Inscriptions also began to challenge Microsoft and IBM in the field of enterprise search.
Recently, Oracle Bone Inscriptions launched the latest version of software security enterprise search engine to enter the enterprise search market. In order to expand the influence of the product, its CEO Larry? Ellison also personally went to the launching ceremony in Tokyo, Japan to deliver a speech, stressing that SES will seize the market gap left by companies such as Google and Microsoft.
He, senior business manager of content management and collaboration in China District, Oracle Bone Inscriptions, told the reporter: "10 generation Oracle Bone Inscriptions software security enterprise search engine can search and index the internal and external data of the enterprise in detail on the premise of fully complying with the enterprise security policy. He Xiongming said: "There are many search technology experts in Oracle Bone Inscriptions to develop enterprise search products, including general search products and other more important search products. "
He Xiongmin said that these Oracle Bone Inscriptions search products also include phrase recognition, name recognition and place name recognition. Although these functions seem insignificant, many consumer-oriented search companies, including Yahoo, Google, MSN and AOL, do not have these functions.
Lv Benfu, vice president of School of Management, Graduate School of Chinese Academy of Sciences, said in an interview that the most attractive aspect of Oracle search products is the database products that search technology relies on. Oracle database products are the best in the world, which other smaller search companies can't achieve.
Despite being attacked by Microsoft, Oracle Bone Inscriptions and IBM, Google seems to be getting better and better. Recently, Google publicly stated that the sales of its corporate business nearly doubled last year.
However, analysts of market research organization AMR said that in the enterprise search market, the gap between Google and Microsoft is very obvious, while Oracle Bone Inscriptions and IBM specialize in database search. Microsoft obviously doesn't want the miracle of Google's online search to repeat itself, but it can't avoid Oracle Bone Inscriptions or IBM becoming two other competitors similar to Google in the search field.
Is it really like a mountain?
Why didn't the joining of many VIP companies change the dominance of professional search companies? Will the same search be "interlaced like a mountain"? What are the thresholds for Internet search companies and database giants?
Recently, Google has also actively established cooperative relations with consulting companies and commercial software suppliers to promote its enterprise search business through consulting services and technical integration.
But enterprise users are not good at service: their requirements are far higher than those of individual users. This is also an important reason why Google is currently difficult to gain recognition in this field.
Due to the differences in technical routes, Internet search engine companies do enterprise search, and the practical application effect of their enterprise search products in enterprises is not as good as that of professional enterprise search companies. In addition, Internet search companies are also questioned by industry analysts and enterprise CIOs in grasping the information management needs of enterprises, ensuring the security of confidential data of enterprises, and providing professional support services.
In the view of product manager He, the influence of Internet companies such as Google is mainly to change the usage habits of enterprise users. The simplicity, ease of use and visibility of their products have brought brand-new feelings to enterprise users who are used to complex and cumbersome large-scale applications.
From a technical point of view, although Internet search is generally regarded as a field with high technical threshold, the technology needed to play enterprise search is more complicated.
Tianyu Company, which has nearly 20 years' research history of Chinese natural language and full-text retrieval technology, has widely used enterprise search engines in China. Mao Chuxiang, general manager of the company, believes. There are many things to find in network search, and enterprises can't search for one less.
In response to this challenge, enterprise search manufacturer Sunshine Huibo put forward the concept of intelligent search. Through this technology, you can search for contents in various Text formats in various databases, such as text, Word, Excel, PPT, PDF and data formats, and even search for multimedia documents.
Intelligent search technology pays attention to the logical relationship of words in documents. It comprehensively considers the context in which words appear, and can find documents that may not contain specific words but contain related concepts. In addition, it can also realize concept refining or case-based refining.
Domestic TRS companies are good at Chinese information intelligent processing and full-text retrieval technology. According to He, the marketing manager, in terms of applications, users can use them directly or build applications easily. It avoids the harsh conditions from application planning to deployment and implementation, and it usually requires a more standardized application environment and a more dedicated consulting and implementation team to really get results.
The new generation file management system developed by Tianyu Company covers almost all business processes, and can realize the management and full-text retrieval of full-text files. At the same time, Tianyu also realized the associated management and integrated application of multimedia files such as pictures, characters, audio and video for the first time in China.
Wang Li, general manager of Tianyu Beijing Branch, told the reporter that at present, Tianyu's comprehensive digital file management system has been successfully applied to high-end users in a certain state office, Zhongzhi 00 1 army and other countries. The advantages of the new generation file management system in full-text management and rapid, accurate and comprehensive utilization of files have been highly recognized and well evaluated by users.
Does the third generation search engine search rivers and lakes uniformly?
For example, Internet search and enterprise search, just like Mercedes-Benz and Li Xia Auto. The former only provides basic search function, while the latter can provide users with more additional and value-added services. Then, can enterprise-level search technology be popularized and applied to Internet search, and can the third-generation search engine dominated by enterprise-level search technology unify the search of rivers and lakes?
From the perspective of user experience, the current Internet search engines emphasize search results more than search quality. Insiders further pointed out that the second generation search engines such as Google with PageRank algorithm as the core have limitations.
Although Google's ranking algorithm is actually far more complicated than PageRank algorithm, due to the limitations of keyword search itself, Google has not distanced itself from its competitors in the relevance of search results. With the fast search feedback and the appearance of many search results, the second generation search engine technology can't get accurate results.
Companies that focus on enterprise search try to transplant technology to Internet search and seize market share from the second generation search engine by providing more accurate and personalized search results.
For example, the internet search engine Clusty, its company can learn from the pattern recognition technology and automatic classification of Sunshine Huibo, and provide automatic classification of search results based on the understanding of search concepts. In addition, there are Grokker, Snap, Dogpile and other websites. It also shifted Google users with more personalized search results.
In China, in addition to social search engines like Bbmao, which can automatically classify texts to help users find the information they need more quickly, Yahoo China, a veteran search company, has also made many improvements in search algorithm and presentation mode, which not only strengthens the data capture of community content, blogs and other content, but also makes great progress in personalized presentation and fuzzy search.
Two months ago, Yahoo China, Yahoo Global and Alibaba jointly launched a search engine with intelligent fuzzy matching function-Yahoo Match. China Yahoo and Alibaba claim that the system can judge users' search habits and intentions when using Yahoo to search information.
Facing the unstructured enterprise information, which will double in three months, Sunlight Huibo adopted a completely different pattern matching and concept search algorithm from the second generation search engine, enabling computers to understand the information by using context.
Although up to now, the computer can't fully understand the language, but through the above concept recognition technology, Sunshine Huibo has been able to understand the meaning of information and the relationship between information. When searching, users can directly input a sentence, a paragraph or even an article in natural language. Sunshine Expo will automatically judge the concepts described by the user's query conditions, and find all documents related to the user's search concepts from the enterprise document library. Obviously, semantic search can locate users' search intention more accurately than traditional keyword search.
"There is a lot of useful information, but the key step in using information is to understand it first. In other words, you need to understand the content, send it to the right people, and connect the information with other related information and people. This is also the uniqueness of enterprise search like Sunshine Huibo. " Jean-Pierre Krausse, an engineer at the headquarters of Zurich Risk Engineering Group, a financial services company, pointed out.
As a transcendence of the second generation search, Wang Hongliang, a senior Internet observer, believes that the algorithmic revolution of the third generation search is not only reflected in the presentation of search results, but also in the evolving search applications, such as personalized search, social search, localized search, knowledge quiz community, community content search and so on. In the core search technology, it generally includes artificial intelligence, pattern recognition, semantic analysis, neural network and other development directions.
Due to the huge cost of neural network search and artificial intelligence search, there is no formed search engine at present. However, IT giants including Google, Microsoft and IBM have put the research and development of artificial intelligence search on the agenda. In China, Aisuo, which has been prepared for 7 years, is even more eager to launch artificial intelligence search products.
However, according to Chang, an analyst at CCID Consulting's Internet and E-commerce Consulting Center, search engines and even Google's search algorithms are far from mature. In the pursuit of accurate search and user experience, China's Baidu, Sina, world-class Yahoo and Google are all in the primary exploration stage. For the lack of search accuracy, this is also the reason why the weakness of the second generation search is highlighted. As the core of the second generation search, Pagerank has many problems in web page ranking, content presentation, search accuracy and so on.
It is often said that the newly emerging third-generation search combines a series of advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence and pattern recognition, which really represents the development direction of search technology, but now Internet search vendors are also making different attempts in this respect, that is to say, the application of these advanced technologies is not only the originality of these so-called enterprise search engines. Judging from the current situation, the most obvious improvement of the third generation search is mainly focused on the personalized presentation of search results, such as making certain classifications and so on. This is indeed a place that existing search vendors should pay attention to.
Become a media company?
Search technology has developed greatly and its prospects are attractive, but why are there no major innovations in companies such as Google? In addition to technical reasons, the narrow enterprise search market and the input-output cost of internet search improvement are important reasons why Google has not made great strides in technology.
As a leading enterprise in Internet search, why has Google made few innovations in search in recent years? Yu Yang, president of Analysys International, pointed out that it is not that Google and Yahoo are unwilling to increase technology investment, but that the cost of improving the algorithm is greater than improving the consumer experience. At present, the second generation search can partially meet the search needs of consumers, and a mature search advertising model is the foundation for Google to make money. In this case, Google will not give up the current search technology and model unless it finds a product or profit model with high input-output ratio.
"Google is actually a media company, and its main income comes from advertising. It is very different from the current profit model of enterprise search. " Yu Yang added that developing enterprise search by making software needs to be mature in the macro market.
"There are also a hundred flowers in this market, which is why domestic companies have not grown bigger." Yu Yang said, "Enterprise-level search must have a premise, that is, the information level of related enterprises should be relatively high. At this time, enterprises have the need to integrate scattered information within enterprises. At present, the overall level of informatization in China is low, and the informatization level of most small and medium-sized enterprises is low, not to mention enterprise-level search. "
Yu Yang thinks: "Today, China enterprises are faced with the heavy responsibility of finding business opportunities. This is also the reason why the advertising model of Internet search engines can be popular. But in the long run, China enterprises will definitely get rid of homogeneous price competition and rely more on brand and innovation. At this time, the integration of internal information is very necessary. "
Nevertheless, domestic enterprise search also has applications in electric power, telecommunications, finance and other fields, and there are many typical application cases of large enterprises. Analysts pointed out that with the popularity of search and the development of information technology, enterprise-level search will also make great progress in China.
In China, the enterprise market is expected to be 200 million yuan, with TRS accounting for about 50 million yuan, and Baidu accounting for120,000 yuan last year (data comes from Nasdaq financial report). According to IDC's recent research report, the market space of enterprise search in the future will be about $70 ~ 654.38+0 billion, and it will be accompanied by the mutual penetration of enterprise search and web search market. The above statistics do not include Google, because Google adopts the strategy of bundling software and hardware.
According to He, the marketing manager, the enterprise search market needs to be cultivated, and it will exceed $654.38 billion in the future. In addition, the consulting market of enterprise search is bigger than the product market, which is one of the reasons why Google is also cooperating with consulting companies.
Wangtong, CEO of Wang Tong Information Technology Co., Ltd. pointed out that, unlike the situation that foreign search engine enterprises and Internet applications go hand in hand, in China, the application of search engines is hot and cold. In the Internet search engine application market, the heat of the search engine marketing market is heating up and the competition is becoming increasingly fierce. However, in the corresponding enterprise application market, limited by the level of enterprise informatization, the application development of enterprise search is extremely uneven, and people's understanding of search engines only stays in the application of enterprise competitive intelligence and traditional full-text retrieval.
Wangtong believes that the domestic enterprise-level search situation has not been opened because the demand of enterprises has not yet risen. At present, the demand for enterprise search is concentrated in information-intensive industries, such as government, media and large enterprises. These industries are highly informatized, so the demand for enterprise-level search is also very strong. After accumulating a large amount of information, these enterprises began to think about how to reuse this information, rise to the height of knowledge management, or how to obtain more valuable information. This has created the demand for full-text retrieval and competitive intelligence within enterprises.
"At present, there are few professional search software vendors in the domestic enterprise search market, and even fewer companies have accumulated for more than 5 years." Wangtong said.
Liu, a senior consultant of Bai Na Consulting Group, summed up the problems faced by the current enterprise search market as follows: "The low degree of informatization, insufficient popularization of enterprise search concepts and uncertain payment model are the three major problems that need to be overcome in the current enterprise search market."
Faced with these problems, advertising in enterprises is a bold idea. Analysts believe that Google provides enterprise search technology in the hope that one day it can develop a platform to carry more advertising services, so that advertisements can reach those employees who have financial ability. But the enterprise itself may not want to sponsor such a service, and at the same time, it does not want to see advertisements appearing in its own network.
In this regard, Matthew Glotzbach, Google's corporate product director, predicted that corporate search would bring new markets to advertisers, search service providers and enterprises themselves. Grozbach believes: "Imagine that advertisers are definitely willing to pay huge fees to the CIOs of Fortune 500 companies to advertise on their networks."
However, in Yang's view, it is difficult to get through at present. He pointed out that Yahoo did search earlier than Google, but Yahoo did not go to the advertising model and become a portal because the Internet advertising market in the United States was not mature at that time. Google's concise search and reasonable advertising model at the right time have been successful.
"In the current immature enterprise search market, it is difficult for software companies like Sunshine Huibo and TRS to make profits by advertising, or to succeed in the enterprise search field like Google." Yu Yang said.
TRS Marketing Manager He: The enterprise search market needs to be cultivated, and it will be more than $654.38 billion in the future.
After completing the acquisition of verity Company last year, Sunshine Huibo Company also showed its determination to win in the China market.
Reporter's notes
You can't have your cake and eat it?
The greatest value of the network lies in the free dissemination of information, which directly leads to an unprecedented expansion of information, which makes us have to rely on search engines to find what we need.
When the reporter entered the word "enterprise search" in the three major search engines, it took Google 0.2 seconds to retrieve 29.8 million results, Yahoo 0.23 seconds to return 210.3 million results, and Baidu 0.054 seconds to return 4.63 million results.
From these search results, we can see that most search engines in internet search emphasize the speed and quantity of search, but unfortunately, most people can only look at the first few of the millions of search results presented by search engines after the blink of an eye.
A famous survey found that employees in American enterprises spend an average of 1/8 of their working time looking for information hidden in their computers or intranets. However, the existing Internet search engines cannot effectively handle a large number of nonlinear and unstructured data in enterprises. In this case, the influence of internet search engines that emphasize wide coverage and low relevance in the field of enterprise users is gradually weakening.
It is not easy to deal with many unstructured information, such as video, audio, attachments in e-mail, etc. If you install a desktop search tool, you will find that you need to index and record the content in your computer for a long time before searching.
In the field of search, efficiency and accuracy always seem to be contradictory.
By improving the algorithm, some of the latest enterprise search technologies have excited many people. Intelligent and accurate search function will undoubtedly add more user stickiness to search engines and bring immeasurable potential economic benefits.
If more and more industry websites can embed powerful search functions in their own platforms to make the search fast and accurate, it will certainly expand the social influence of the search engine industry and create a better future for improving the operational efficiency of enterprises and the development of e-commerce among enterprises.
For users, no matter how the search technology evolves, the user search interface will certainly become more and more simple and convenient. Every collision between efficiency and accuracy may bring users a more wonderful application experience. All this is something to be happy for users.
Mao Chuxiang, general manager of Tianyu Company: There are many things to be found in online search, but in enterprise search, it is just not to miss any one, but to be accurate.
Yu Yang, President of Analysys International: In the current immature enterprise search market, it is difficult for software companies like Sunshine Huibo and TRS to profit from advertisements, and it is also difficult to be as successful as Google.
The difference between Internet search and enterprise search
Internet search:
Visible Internet content-extensive and shallow
Contains a lot of content and a lot of topics-there are many categories.
The content is mostly flat (HTML, PDF) and static (including news).
Obtaining these contents is legal and can be seen by all users.
Unique unstructured information-words, pictures, etc.
Enterprise search:
Information within the enterprise-narrow and deep
Includes a limited range of content topics-limited classification.
Rich and dynamic-different file formats and types.
Content acquisition requires corresponding rights.
Most unstructured information?
Chain connection
The main participants in China's enterprise search market.
Professional teams: autonomous, TRS, Tianyu
Comprehensive team: Microsoft, Oracle Bone Inscriptions, IBM.
Internet team: Google, Yahoo