New version for www.kartoo.com

The www.kartoo.com search engine launches a new version

The www.kartoo.com search engine launches a new version

Clermont-Ferrand, France, on March 7th, 2003: KartOO SA, publisher of the www.kartoo.com search engine, announces the official launch of the new version of its internet tool with a cartographic interface. Having developed the loyalty of hundreds of thousands of monthly users with the V2 version, they now offer a new version benefiting from technological headway in term of relevancy, speed, and presentation of the results within a clearer topographic interface. This third version is much more intuitive, making it easier to use for novice users, and optimizes access to the advanced functions for expert Internet users. Together with the release of this V3, KartOO SA continues its international development with the launch of a German version.

Major Innovations

- New presentation of the results map: The subjects connecting the balls of sites are now represented topographically. The most relevant subjects form large mountains, with secondary subjects displayed as small hills. With this improvement, the map remains simple and legible even with a large number of sites. This is an important advantage with regard to the classic search engines that have difficulty displaying 10 descriptions of the returned sites on a single screen.

- 2 modes of use: According to level of expertise, the user can choose either the basic mode which quickly posts a very legible map, or the expert mode which allows the user to refine the thematics and to increase the number of pages posted on the map.

- Clustering: the expert mode groups pages found on the same site together. On the map, these groupings are represented by balls connected to one another: a yellow ball for the most relevant page and red balls for secondary pages.

- Optimization: KartOO now uses now Flash5, which reduces the loading time and improves the interface. At the same time, new servers were set up in the USA to accelerate our tool.

- Top Sites : The " Top sites " menu allows faster access to the most relevant sites.

Laurent Baleydier, chairman and co-founder of KartOO SA : For years now, WWW surfers have been disappointed by the quality of search engine results. One day I asked myself the question: what does a relevant result mean? It all depends on the question and context. For example, if a user types the word "car", what kind of site do we have to offer her? Pages about the car manufacturers, rental agencies, and car collectors. A traditional search engine returns all that in a linear list of numbered sites, without asking more of the user. But if Im looking for rental car, I will be very disappointed to find a list of manufacturers and collectors. We need to alter the experience in two ways . First, the results must yield results by search themes and if possible, position them in relation to each other, with links to the sites with those themes. This is where the idea of the map comes from. Second, we must help the user refine her search, always remembering that she is not a booleen mathematician and that she shouldnt have to learn all the advanced syntax.

About KartOO SA

KARTOO S.A. is a privately held company with a finance capital of 125.000 Euros. The company was created by Laurent and Nicolas Baleydier after a significant R&D program started in 1998.

This R&D program allowed them to develop an innovative search technology : KartOO, instead of responding to a query with pages and pages of links, shows the results on a relevant graphical interface, which displays a large amount of data at a glance.

KartOO is a business solutions software publisher in the following areas:

- Metasearch tool allowing data mining from several sources (intranet, database, EDMS, ERP systems, web portals, etc.)
- Knowledge managemement
- Competitive intelligence
- Visual display interfaces or terminals ( cartographic, topographic, network, etc.)

The head office and development team of KartOO are based in Clermont-Ferrand.

In 2003, KartOO plans to develop the international distribution of its first products through a direct sales network, and also through partners in several local markets (consultants, software distributors, etc.).

Press contact
Alexandre Dos Santos
Alex@kartoo.com