Software optimizes new technology search, addresses market needs.

Business revolves around matching market needs with products, technologies and services. Often the first step we take in attempting to make this match involves performing an internet search. But those internet search engines simply look for a word or phrase embedded in web pages, returning "hits" ranked by popularity that may not be what we want. And we may not be able to find the data we really want. We have to weed through all the search results and find useful intelligence, and then compile a synopsis of relevant results.

But now a company born from the Media Lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology is demonstrating and marketing software that automates the manual process of doing research and coming to conclusions. It does so by extracting the deep meanings in conversational linguistics in such a way that ordinary sentences are broken down into different components, including the problem, the solution, the beneficiaries, an action and the benefit. These parts of a sentence are then matched to search terms to return highly relevant information.

Essentially, Accelovation's market discovery software--an on-demand web application--combines search and text analytics technologies with a keen focus on the business processes required to answer sophisticated market questions quickly. To determine if a solution or market exists, Accelovation applies advanced natural language processing, text mining and analytics capabilities to an innovator's need or problem statement and then looks for online information that shares similar characteristics.

After translating a problem statement into the benefits it seeks and expanding the search input into myriads of variations, the product launches thousands of queries across billions of web and subscription content pages to find the insights needed to extract the desired answers--all within a few minutes. While the product can retrieve information that uses similar language, the real value is in its ability to find information that is talked about in entirely different ways yet describes the same fundamental needs or benefits.

The emerging field of text analytics includes technologies and processes for synthesizing insights from natural language. These tools make it possible for a business analyst to perform a variety of research tasks, such as drawing conclusions about consumer sentiments or discovering new solutions to technical problems. Accelovation is providing the text analytics tools that business analysts need to conduct research throughout the innovation process.

Price range for the software is from $50,000 and up to seven figures, depending on the number of users. The product is available in North America and internationally on a limited basis. Accelovation is also developing a new product specifically designed for R&D professionals and research teams, which is expected to be available in early 2008.

Further information. Barrett Foster, Accelovation Inc., 2087 Landings Dr., Mountain View, CA 94043; phone: 650-968-4872; fax: 650-968-4872; email: bfoster@accelovation.com.