Expert System USA

Company: Expert System USA, West Hartford, CT
Entry Submitted By: SHIFT Communications
Company Description: Expert System is a provider of semantic software, which discovers, classifies and interprets text information. All Expert System products, based on the patent pending technology COGITO®, leverage the company’s expertise in the development of business solutions for primary markets and support the activities of Knowledge Management, Customer Care, Corporate Intelligence and Homeland Security.
Nomination Category: Products & Product Management Categories
Nomination Sub Category: New Product or Service of the Year - Computer Software - New Version

Nomination Title: Expert System’s Updated COGITO® Focus

1. Tell the story about this nominated product or service (up to 500 words). Describe its function, features, benefits, and sales to date. You may include hyperlinks to product photos and data sheets. IMPORTANT: Begin each link with http://, and enclose each link in square brackets; for example, [http://www.youraddress.com]:

The ability to search for and capture data that illustrates the “big picture” is
essential for businesses, especially as an increasing amount of information
lives on the Web. Using semantic, rather than keyword, search guarantees the
most accurate search results, uncovering relevant information from thousands of
potential results. Having a technology that properly interprets data’s
high-level meaning eliminates the costly and time-consuming need to execute
multiple trial-and-error searches.

In May 2008, Expert System USA released the first version of COGITO Focus, a
revolutionary semantic indexing, search and analysis tool to manage strategic
internal and external information. It does this by understanding search terms
and text as a human would comprehend the meaning, tone and implications of the
written word.

This year, Expert System brought COGITO Focus to the next level by introducing
an updated version in March. The updated COGITO Focus extends the search
capabilities for all data and interactive analysis, giving users even more tools
to “connect the dots” about topics and trends.

To further illustrate this semantic vs. keyword idea, a semantic search would be
able to determine whether a search for “jaguar” should focus on the animal or
the car. A keyword search would leave you to sort through tons of articles on
both topics to determine which are relevant. Similarly, a keyword search for
“disability legislation” would ignore any information on “equal opportunity
law,” even though both terms have the same concept.

Through the recent updates, COGITO Focus automatically makes all of these
connections and helps to streamline the search process as a whole. In addition
to the three new features outlined below, COGITO Focus now considers both
structured and unstructured (RSS feeds, Web pages, social networks) content, as
well as companies’ internal sources when executing a search. The updated
technology also does a lot of post-search legwork, shedding light on how new
information can be applied to achieve business success.

Major updates include:

• Faceted Navigation and Streamlined Search: Whereas traditional search engines
require the user to establish the various facets before launching a search,
COGITO Focus does the backend work to automatically present the concepts,
entities, etc. at the end of each search. Users then know how to modify their
parameters to get the content they need, eliminating the guesswork and
increasing efficiency.

• Semantic Intelligent Agents: Given the Internet's scope, businesses must
integrate structured (private) and unstructured (Web-based) documents to
maximize knowledge and see the big picture. COGITO Focus independently monitors
and captures new content from sources including company servers, forums, blogs,
comment streams and Web sites.

• Maps of Relations and Relevance: Once a search is complete, COGITO Focus
continues to help users derive the most value from their content, creating maps
that illustrate the semantic relations between concepts and entities of analyzed
documents.

Today’s businesses need more than basic search capabilities can give. By
providing in-depth analysis of information, COGITO Focus helps users achieve a
precise, complete picture while also grasping the crucial and strategic data
that continues to grow.

2. List hyperlinks to any online news stories, press releases, product reviews, or other documents that support the claims made in the section above. IMPORTANT: Begin each link with http://, and enclose each link in square brackets; for example, [http://www.youraddress.com]:

COGITO Focus page:
http://www.expertsystem.net/page.asp?id=1521&idd=194

COGITO Focus brochure:
http://www.expertsystem.net/documenti/pdf_eng/products/cogito_focus/us_cogito_focus.pdf

COGITO Focus video demo:
http://www.expertsystem.net/documenti/movies/cogito%20focus%20-%20new%20features.wmv

News stories:
http://www.semanticweb.com/news/find_analyze_and_act_streamline_efforts_with_cogito_focus_155225.asp

Press release announcing updated COGITO Focus:
http://expertsystem.net/news.asp?idd=1559

3. Provide a brief (up to 100 words) biography about the leader(s) of the team that developed this nominated product or service:

As the co-founder and CTO of Expert System, Marco Varone drove the development
of Expert System’s innovative semantic network, COGITO, and thus, the enterprise
search product nominated, COGITO Focus.

With COGITO, Varone led a development team that combined linguistics and
information technology to create the best solution for search, classification
and extraction of unstructured information, enabling enterprises to achieve a
competitive advantage through effective strategic knowledge management and
development of intellectual capital. Because COGITO comprehends text, it
controls the chaos generated by the thousands of files, documents, emails,
articles and Web pages that have to be managed every day.