FirstGov.gov Goes Live with Vivisimo's Velocity Next-Generation Search Portal; Vivisimo and MSN Search Provide Exclusive Search Backbone for New FirstGov.gov Search Portal

Business Wire, Jan 24, 2006

PITTSBURGH -- Vivisimo (www.Vivisimo.com), creator of innovative software to access and cluster the world's information for better search and discovery, today announced that FirstGov.gov, the official Web portal of the U.S. Government (http://www.firstgov.gov), has launched using Vivisimo's Velocity Web search platform. The redesigned portal, which went live today, leverages Velocity's search, federated-search and clustering capabilities, combined with expanded search results from Microsoft MSN Search. This turnkey, hosted search solution serves as the technology backbone for Kids.gov, Espanol.gov and Consumer.gov, which are sister sites designed for specific audiences.

The new FirstGov.gov search service delivers a superior, streamlined experience for the millions of citizens that visit the portal every year. FirstGov.gov uses Velocity to selectively crawl government documents and Web pages, meta search government resources and cluster all of the results into thematic categories. These capabilities, combined with an MSN search index more than five times larger than the old FirstGov.gov search index, deliver a much more comprehensive and feature-rich search for the user. As a result, users spend less time navigating the vast bureaucracy of government information, and spend more time finding information relevant to their search and exploring relevant topics in depth.

"The combination of Vivisimo and MSN Search creates a powerful new FirstGov.gov search that will make users more productive and better informed," said MJ Pizzella, associate administrator of GSA's Office of Citizen Services and Communications. "Vivisimo's flexibility and the MSN Search index provide us with a robust search solution that unlocks vast amounts of federal, state and local information for FirstGov.gov users. The new features, combined with the reduction in cost to build, deploy and maintain the new FirstGov.gov search service result in unmatched value for the U.S. Government and the taxpayers."

Vivisimo's Velocity Web search platform selectively crawls and indexes a variety of government sources, including frequently asked question documents (FAQs), government forms, government job postings, audio podcasts and consumer product reports, to return value-added sources and combine them with Web results at FirstGov.gov. A search on "tax returns" returns FAQs addressing questions such as "Where do I get a tax return?" and "How do I get a copy of a previous year's tax return?"

Additionally, the new service will offer clustering capabilities that take large amounts of search results and sort them into thematic folders for easier navigation. As a result, even the most ambiguous queries result in clearly defined themes about which the user can explore further. For example, a search on "Congress" returns folders of results related to the "Library of Congress," "108th Congress," "Senate," "Representatives" and "Address to Congress."

"The new FirstGov.gov search shows off all the elements of modern search: use of search results from multiple search engines, clustering into folders, and custom crawling of high-value government products such as FAQs, databases, forms and others," said Raul Valdes-Perez, CEO and co-founder of Vivisimo. "Vivisimo is proud to work with GSA and MSN to build the finest government search portal in the world."

"MSN is excited that Vivisimo chose to develop on top of our search platform to deliver an innovative solution for FirstGov.gov," said Christopher Payne, corporate vice president, MSN Search at Microsoft. "Microsoft and Vivisimo are helping the federal government fully leverage the Web to help consumers find precisely what they are looking for with a best-in-class offering for the government domain."

The Velocity platform also powers Vivisimo's award-winning consumer

search portal, Clusty.com. FirstGov.gov will have the ability to leverage Vivisimo's improvements to the Clusty.com service, which will ensure that FirstGov.gov will consistently offer a first-class user experience featuring the latest search technology.

The Vivisimo Velocity search platform provides a single interface to search, meta search and cluster internal and external content. Instead of long lists of results, users are presented with results organized into categories without incurring the cost and complexity of taxonomy-building. Incorporating Vivisimo's award-winning Clustering Engine, Velocity delivers a superior search experience, unmatched implementation flexibility and increased productivity.

About Vivisimo, Inc.

Vivisimo, Inc. creates innovative software to access and cluster the world's information, for better search and discovery. Fortune 500 businesses, government agencies, academia and millions of searchers use Vivisimo's clustering technology to better organize and navigate massive amounts of information. Vivisimo is the creator of the popular Clusty.com consumer search engine and serves enterprise customers through its suite of clustering, search and federated-search products. Vivisimo serves its global client base through headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pa., and Paris, France, and partners throughout the world. Please visit www.Vivisimo.com to learn more.