Google, a start-up dedicated to providing the best search experience on the web, today announced it has completed a $25-million round of equity funding led by Sequoia Capital and Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Google also announced that Michael Moritz, general partner of Sequoia Capital, and John Doerr, general partner of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, have joined its board of directors. Michael Moritz is currently a director of numerous companies, including Yahoo, eToys, Quote.com, eGroups, PlanetRx, Flextronics, and WebVan. John Doerr was a co-founder of @Home and is a director of several high growth Internet companies, including Amazon.com, Drugstore.com, Handspring, Healtheon/WebMD, Homeshop.com, Intuit, and Sun Microsystems. Google’s technology highlights include PageRank, a patent-pending, objective measure of the importance of web pages. PageRank is computed by solving an equation of 500 million variables and two billion terms. Google’s innovative user interface includes dynamic summaries, a cached web, and the time-saving “I’m feeling lucky” button. Google also offers co-branded solutions for information content providers. Google was founded in September 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, building on three years of research as computer science Ph.D. candidates at Stanford University. http://google.com
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Dataware Technologies, Inc. announced that it has sold one-half of its interest in Northern Light Technology LLC back to Northern Light for $4.1 million and that Northern Light had also repaid its $1.2 million promissory note held by Dataware. After the transactions, Dataware retains an approximate 5% interest in NorthernLight. This transaction will result in a gain of approximately $5.0 million for Dataware Technologies during the second quarter of this year. The$5.0 million will be used as additional working capital. www.dataware.com
Akamai Technologies announced the commercial availability of its first offering, FreeFlow. FreeFlow has been in commercial use since the beginning of April and to date has delivered more than 10 billion hits for some of the biggest sites on the Web. The service dramatically improves Web site performance and reliability, and is backed by Akamai’s Proof of Performance guarantee. In a separate announcement today, the company named Yahoo! as one of its charter FreeFlow customers. FreeFlow was designed around the needs of high-volume Web sites in eCommerce, new media, and Global 2,000 businesses. To help the customer assess FreeFlow’s performance during the evaluation period, Akamai contracts with Keynote Systems, a third-party measurement service. Based on the testing done by this independent authority, the customer is able to evaluate the speed and reliability improvements of FreeFlow. The results show exactly how FreeFlow performed using live traffic, and are compared with the customer’s existing processes. FreeFlow customers pay only for the network resources they use — no capital investment is required. Usage charges are priced according to megabits per second of content served. Customers commit to a minimum usage level and may “burst” above this commitment. Monthly pricing begins at $2,000 per megabit per second, with discounts for volume usage. www.akamai.com
Microstar Software Ltd. announced a strategic alliance with XIA Information Architects Corporation. The alliance between Microstar and XIA Information Architects provides a combination of skills and expertise for the design and implementation of the new networked business models. These new models require the inter-mediation and exchange of content and transactions between heterogeneous groups of buyers and sellers over the Internet. XIA Information Architects helps organizations to exploit the opportunities provided by XML-enabled multi-enterprise systems and to maximize the value of their IT investment. Microstar develops integrated solutions using the latest XML and SGML content management and e-commerce Internet products. Solutions for the companies’ clients leverage the built-in intelligence of XML encoded information to facilitate the integration of supply chains of all types. The result is lower operational costs and wider market reach. www.microstar.com.
Datalogics announced the latest release of the FrameLink Product Family in conjunction with DOCUMENTUM, Inc.’s launch of DOCUMENTUM 4i. FrameLink offers organizations flexibility with their document creation, document management, and publishing processes by integrating Adobe FrameMaker authoring tools and DOCUMENTUM’s DOCUMENTUM 4i. The FrameLink Product Family line consists of four products: FrameLink, FrameLink+SGML, FrameLink for AutoRender Pro, and the FrameLink DocPage Builder Extension. FrameLink allows authors of technical documents, manuals, and product information to manage complex documents directly from within FrameMaker, while maintaining document links. With FrameLink+SGML, authors of SGML documents in FrameMaker+SGML can manage the reuse of components down to the element level. FrameLink for AutoRender Pro allows users to automatically render and manage PDF files from within FrameMaker tools. This enables them to distribute documents for review and can provide an end-to-end solution for publishing complex documents. Finally, the FrameLink DocPage Builder Extension is a tool kit that can adapt FrameLink to meet specific publishing needs of customers. www.datalogics.com
SAP AG and BackWeb Technologies announced an agreement to leverage BackWeb’s Internet communication infrastructure and selected application modules as part of the SAP Customer Relationship Management offerings. The SAP Sales, SAP Service, and SAP Marketing solutions together make up a CRM solution designed to manage the entire life cycle of customer relationships. The combined solution provides customers with intelligent information gathering from the Internet and intranet that is easily delivered to the desktop for efficiency and enhanced decision-making capabilities. Specifically, the agreement with BackWeb includes bundling the BackWeb Foundation, the Automated Marketing Encyclopedia and the Market Intelligence Manager with both the SAP Sales and SAP Service solutions. The BackWeb Foundation, BackWeb’s Internet communication infrastructure, is a priority communications system based on a set of technologies that enable an organization to capture information from any data source and efficiently and reliably deliver it throughout the extended enterprise. The Market Intelligence Manager automatically gathers information about competitors, customers and the marketplace from any Internet or intranet location. The Automated Marketing Encyclopedia automatically delivers large documents to multiple users reliably and securely. BackWeb enables companies to adapt quickly to changing market conditions through direct interaction with their sales and service personnel, thereby accelerating the execution of their business processes www.backweb.com
SoftQuad Software Inc. has started shipping XMetaL 1.0, a full-featured, easy-to-use XML authoring tool. XMetaL is an advanced, simple to deploy XML authoring tool for customers working with XML and SGML. Modeled on common word processing applications, it offers a familiar, easy-to-use, authoring environment that virtually eliminates unnecessary learning curves and training costs. By easily creating XML content, XMetaL eliminates the need to convert documents authored in traditional word processors, streamlines the publishing process and substantially reduces conversion expenses. XMetaL’s extensive customization features enable the authoring environment to be optimized for any DTD, in many instances without programming. Its COM-based architecture and support for any Windows scripting language ensure that XMetaL can be extended and integrated into any existing publishing infrastructure. Its comprehensive support of SGML and web technologies makes XMetaL a tool for any hybrid SGML/XML environment. XMetaL is shipping today and is available at a cost of U.S. $495 per single user license. The product will be sold both directly and through VARs and OEMs. Volume discounts, site licenses, partner programs and on-site training are all available. www.softquad.com
OASIS announced the creation of XML.ORG, a global XML industry portal to be operated by a non-profit corporation devoted to open information exchange. Over 23 industry-leading corporations, organizations and individual experts have voiced support for the formation of XML.ORG. Central to XML.ORG will be an open industry XML registry and repository offering automated public access to XML schemas. The registry/repository will play a critical enabling role in the use of industry-defined XML applications for electronic commerce, business-to-business transactions, and tools and application interoperability. The debut of XML.ORG signifies a major step in OASIS’ ongoing registry and repository efforts, work that has been in progress for the last the 12 months. In keeping with its consensus-focused mission, OASIS will strive to ensure interoperability with existing and emerging XML initiatives, and will continue to actively solicit participation by any similar efforts. Companies who fund the XML.ORG web site are called XML.ORG partners. Founding partners will be given the one-time opportunity to join the XML.ORG Steering Committee, which is responsible for setting XML.ORG priorities, defining the technical direction of the portal, and determining what kinds of XML specifications are in or out of scope for the XML registry. www.oasis-open.org
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