Vivisimo, a leader in enterprise search,  announced that Procter & Gamble has won the KMWorld Reality award for demonstrating knowledge management leadership with its successful deployment and use of the award-winning Velocity Enterprise Search platform.

Through its deployment of the Vivisimo Enterprise Search Platform, P&G users have reduced the time spent searching for documents and increased overall productivity. Additionally, P&G users have increased knowledge sharing by using search as a new means of collaborating. Through a single search interface, users now have the ability to locate experts within their organization to connect with and share knowledge.

“Today’s award is another validation of our decision to choose Velocity to power our search needs,” said Bud Miyahara, Section Manager, P&G. “With the aid of Velocity, we have improved the user satisfaction of our search offering and have been able to deliver key business search needs. Velocity has also given us the ability to deliver future search capability with little worry of technological limitations.”

The award, which recognizes an organization in which knowledge management is a positive reality, was given to P&G during the KMWorld Reality ceremony at the Enterprise Search Summit in San Jose earlier this week.

Read more right here.

Happy Monday everyone. Let’s start off the week withsome positive news. The folks at Vivisimo keep the good stuff coming. Check this out:

Building on the success of its award-winning enterprise search solution and its accelerated expansion into OEM and reseller markets, Vivisimo  launched the Velocity Enterprise Search Platform 7.5. Available as a standalone search solution or as an embedded OEM version for partner applications, Velocity 7.5 introduces significant enhancements in extensibility, scalability and performance.

Velocity 7.5 marks Vivisimo’s most significant step in extending the power of Velocity for partners and customers looking to build and deliver search centric applications. By building out and expanding the open API layer, Vivisimo is providing customers, OEMs, partners and systems integrators greater access to the entire Velocity architecture and its rich feature set. These organizations can now leverage the search development platform to add value to existing applications and develop new solutions that take advantage of the volumes of information assets within every enterprise.

Read all about it right here.

Here’s some sweet news from enterprise search leader Vivisimo: Gartner, Inc., positioned the company in the leaders quadrant of its Information Access Technology Magic Quadrant report.  The evaluation is based on Vivisimo’s “Completeness of Vision” and its “Ability to Execute.”

“We believe Vivisimo’s leadership position in the Information Access Technology Quadrant reflects the success we have had in helping our customers maximize the business value of their information,” said John Kealey, CEO of Vivisimo.  “Our Velocity search platform unifies access to secure business repositories, presents search results with an unmatched user experience, with an end result of enabling true knowledge sharing across an organization.  We look forward to continued growth in the ever-evolving information access technology market.”

The Vivisimo Velocity Enterprise Search Platform is a flexible and scalable solution for enhancing information access and knowledge sharing across an organization. Velocity customers and partners utilize the rich set of discovery, personalization and collaboration functionality to provide end-users with greater control over their search experience.  Its back-end architecture introduces unprecedented security, connectivity and relevancy into the overall search experience.  The result is improved workforce productivity, enhanced decision making, streamlined business processes and the creation of real value for key external audiences.

 Vivisimo, a leader in enterprise search, recently announced that its Velocity Enterprise Search Platform was named “Trend-Setting Product of 2009″ by KMWorld Magazine. This is the fifth consecutive year that Velocity has received this award.

“We are honored to be on this impressive list selected by the staff and editors of KMWorld Magazine,” said John Kealey, CEO of Vivisimo. “The need for enterprises to quickly find and harness information has never been greater, especially given today’s fast paced ‘on demand’ business environment. We take tremendous pride that our recent innovations in social and conceptual search continue to be recognized for helping enterprises meet these demands.”

KMWorld’s “Trend-Setting Products” awards began in 2003, and represent the software and systems innovations that have expanded the reach and effectiveness of information management. This year, more than 800 products were assessed by the judging panel, which consists of editorial staff, analysts, system integrators, vendors, line-of-business managers, and users. The products selected all demonstrate clearly identifiable technology breakthroughs that serve the vendors’ full spectrum of constituencies, especially their customers.

“The KMWorld ‘Trend-Setting Products’ awards represent the leaders in software and systems innovations,” said Hugh McKellar, editor-in-chief at KMWorld magazine. “The products selected deliver customer value and are most likely to be embraced by the marketplace and gain wide adoption.”

Vivisimo Velocity 7.0, which followed the company’s industry-leading social search release, introduced conceptual search to enterprises and provided customers a new interface to empower their users with explicit control to fine tune queries and personalize search to meet specific information goals. In addition to Velocity 7.0, Vivisimo also released Velocity for OEM, which leveraged the platform’s superior architecture and inherent flexibility into a highly modular design for easy deployment in a variety of markets and applications.

It’s Tech Tuesday on Pittsburgh Business Radio 1360 AM WMNY as the Pittsburgh Technology Council’s Tech Vibe Radio Show hits the air from 3-6 p.m. Hosts Jonathan Kersting and Audrey Russo have some excellent guests on deck. It’s a cavalcade of stars:

• Heather Wylie and Deric Haddad of Haddad Wylie Industries
• Alan Koch of A.S.K. Process
• Congressman Jason Altmire
• Ellen Roth from Getting to the Point
• John Kealey New CEO of Vivisimo

If you can’t tune in, don’t despair. You can stream it right from Pittsburgh Business Radio. We’ve also got plenty of previous interviews available for download.

This news just in from Vivisimo!

The company today announced that John M. Kealey and Kevin E. Calderwood have joined the company as its respective CEO and president, effective immediately. Former CEO and co-founder Raul Valdes-Perez will become executive chairman.

Kealey and Calderwood each brings two decades of executive management experience across a variety of technologies and markets. Both will serve on Vivisimo’s board of directors.

“I am truly excited to join Vivisimo at a time when both its market and sales are growing rapidly,” Kealey said. “Vivisimo’s products and services enable companies that struggle with explosive growth in their electronic information to gain real value from this data. Vivisimo has built a strong foundation for success by bringing award-winning innovative solutions to market quickly, capturing leadership spots in independent industry analyst reports and landing marquis accounts such as Procter & Gamble, Airbus, the U.S. Air Force, USA.gov and LexisNexis. I look forward to building on these successes in moving the company forward to take advantage of the strong market demand for enterprise search.”

“After nine consecutive years of growth and a loyal customer base that spans markets and geographies, Vivisimo’s potential couldn’t be greater,” Calderwood said. “I’ve worked for many companies over the years, but none have had this perfect storm combination of the right product with a hungry, growing market and, of course, the right people. The opportunity here is remarkable.”

Formerly serving Vivisimo on its advisory board, Kealey is an experienced senior executive with more than 25 years in the communications and information technology industries. He is the former president and CEO of iDirect Technologies, which he helped grow to more than $120 million in annual revenue when it was acquired by Singapore Technologies. For a full bio on Kealey, visit http://vivisimo.com/about/management.

Calderwood was a founder and managing partner of Amp Capital Partners, a venture capital firm based in Reston, Va., and Palo Alto, Calif. Calderwood served in executive management for two Amp Capital portfolio companies and as the chairman of the board of iDirect Technologies. Calderwood served in executive and management positions at the Baan Company and at the Oracle Corporation during their early years of explosive growth. For a full bio, visit http://vivisimo.com/about/management.

“John is the perfect leader for Vivisimo. His technology background, strong management experience and knowledge of Vivisimo’s culture and operations will help take us to a new, outstanding phase of corporate growth and market leadership,” said Valdes-Perez, the company’s CEO for the past nine years. “John and Kevin Calderwood both have a distinguished record of accomplishment in a variety of executive roles in successful technology companies. They’ve worked closely together for many years and have proven themselves to be a formidable team.”

Valdes-Perez co-founded Vivisimo in 2000 and was a 2007 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year for the North Central Region. Before Vivisimo he was on the research faculty at Carnegie Mellon University’s computer science department, where he earned a doctorate in computer science in 1991.

New Director Named

In addition to the executive changes, Vivisimo has added Phil Carrai to its board of directors. Currently executive vice president of the $100 million IT solutions group for Kratos Defense, Inc., Carrai has more than 20 years’ experience in technology businesses, ranging from enterprise software and service to mobile media and Internet infrastructure. Carrai has served in leadership roles with Ai Metrix, General Atlantic, the Morino Group, McCabe and Associates and Legent Corporation. As a member of the board of directors, Carrai will play a strategic role in the company’s vision and execution of its business and growth goals.

Carrai joins Kealey, Calderwood, Valdes-Perez, Vivisimo Chief Scientist Jerome Pesenti and North Atlantic Capital’s Mark Morrissette on the board, after having served Vivisimo on its advisory board for more than a year.

“I am looking forward to working closely with John, Kevin and Phil and the rest of the Vivisimo team, as we work together to fulfill our ambition of making enterprise search as ubiquitous in the workplace as web search is in the home,” Valdes-Perez said. “I can’t imagine a more capable team to lead the company into the future.”

Last night, Techburgher was at the Digital Technologies Media Mixer at Vivisimo’s headquarters in Squirrel Hill. The event was sponsored by the Pittsburgh Regional Alliance to give local technology companies exposure to national press. Among the handful of publications were Scientific American and Computer World to name a few.

Presenting companies included DynaVox, Astrobotic Technology, BPL Global, QuantaPoint and Vivisimo.

Each company gave a 10-minute presentation of their operations, technology and competitive advantage. It was fascinating to see such a diversity of technologies all under a single roof. From medical devices to robotic moon rovers to energy and search, the entire tech gamut was in the house.

The media appeared pleasantly engaged with the presentations and Pittsburgh’s overall scene. Hats off to the PRA for organizing and Vivisimo for being such a gracious host.

It’s Technology Tuesday at Pittsburgh Business Radio 1360 AM WMNY. That means the Pittsburgh Technology Council’s Jonathan Kersting and Audrey Russo are behind the mic, powering up TechVibe Radio from 3-6 p.m.

Another star-studded lineup awaits listeners. Guests will include:

• RJ Lee Group
• Silver Tree Solutions
• Vivisimo
• Duquesne’s Entrepreneurs Growth Conference
• Pop artist Peter Max

If you can’t tune in, stream it or find us on www.talkshoe.com (search for Pittsburgh Business Radio)

Squirrel Hill-based Vivisimo has been a regular condiment on Techburgher lately. It’s like they’ve become the chunky salsa giving our news a bunch of zip and flavor. It’s great to see a Pittsburgh tech company making some positive news. Here’s some more:

Vivisimo made one of KMWorld’s “100 Companies that Matter in Knowledge Management,” an annual list published by KMWorld. This is the eighth year of the list and the seventh consecutive year Vivisimo has earned a place on it.

“Each company on KMWorld’s 100 Companies that Matter list embodies as part of its culture agile and limber execution of its mission, embracing a spirit of both adaptability and innovation,” said Hugh McKellar, KMWorld editor in chief.

The recognition by KMWorld caps a year of strong performance for Vivisimo. The privately-held enterprise search developer continued to win new customers; it closed on its first round of financing in eight years of growth; and continued product innovation with the Velocity Search Platform 7.0™, Velocity for OEM and the Velocity Discovery Module™.

Velocity 7.0 followed Vivisimo’s industry-leading social search with conceptual search, including a new interface that gives users explicit control to fine tune queries and personalize search to meet specific information goals. Velocity for OEM leveraged the platform’s superior architecture into a modular design for deployment in different markets and applications. The Velocity Discovery Module enables auto-classification, express tagging and export of documents in their native formats for fast and easy sharing of large numbers of documents.

“Vivisimo is one of the companies that exemplifies the performance necessary for consideration for KMWorld’s list of 100 Companies that Matter,” said McKellar. “The fact that Vivisimo has been listed seven straight times illustrates tenacity and focus – traits that also reflect the continued growth and evolution of our industry into critical strategic and operational functions.”

If your company or organization wants to see how to get more value from all the information it gathers and generates, you might want to see how the U.S. Air Force is using advanced search technology from Pittsburgh’s Vivisimo.

In a free webinar coming up at the end of the month, the director of the Air Force’s Excellence for Knowledge Management will talk about how he added social search from Vivisimo to his more than 300,000-user intranet.  The webinar, sponsored by KMWorld magazine, is Feb. 24 at 2 p.m. ET. 

Titled “The Sky’s the Limit: Using Social Search to Deliver Web. 2.0 to the Air Force,” the webinar will go over details of how the Air Force’s Knowledge Now site is encouraging airmen and other military personnel to contribute their own insight and expertise to the more than 10 million pages of site content.

The Air Force’s use of the social search features in Vivisimo’s Velocity Search Platform is the largest deployment yet in a large enterprise search environment of these Web 2.0 tools of tagging, voting and commenting, and has a lot of lessons in it for private industry to consider.  With the new search features from Vivisimo, AFKN wants to provide quicker access to its millions of pages of content, as well as improve the usefulness of the site’s information. “Leveraging intellectual capital and information is a challenge,” said its director, Randy Adkins. “We use community to capture expertise and distribute best practices much more readily than with point-to-point email or phone conversations.  Knowledge is the critical component in our governance model.” 

Adkins also will discuss how he rates his return on investment in new search technology. Some of the metrics he looks at include hours / year saved; faster search results; better use of meta-data.

Register for the webinar here.