Lucid Imagination Launches as First Commercial Company Dedicated to Apache Lucene/Solr Open Source Search Technology

Company offers support, services and value-add software to new users and over 4,000 current enterprises already using one of top-15 open source projects

• Press Release
• Source: Lucid Imagination
• On 8:00 am EST, Monday January 26, 2009

SAN MATEO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Lucid Imagination today launched as the first commercial open source company dedicated to supporting developers and organizations using the popular and widely installed Apache Lucene and Solr search technologies.

The Lucene search library currently ranks amongst the top-15 open source projects and is one of the top-5 Apache projects, with installations at over 4,000 companies worldwide. Lucene/Solr downloads have grown nearly ten-fold over the past three years, with a current run-rate of over 6,000 downloads a day. The Solr search server, which transforms the Lucene search library into a ready-to-use search platform for building applications, is the fastest growing Lucene sub-project. Apache Lucene/Solr offers an attractive, cost-effective alternative to the proprietary licensed search and discovery software products. The search and discovery market is growing at 28 percent per year, with 2007 revenue of $1.8 billion (IDC, Sept 2008).

As an active participant in the enormous community using this open source search technology, Lucid Imagination offers certified distributions of Lucene and Solr, commercial-grade support, training, high-level consulting and value-added software. The company’s Web site serves as a knowledge portal for the Lucene community, with information and resources to help developers build and deploy Lucene-based solutions in a more efficient and cost-effective manner.

The company’s leadership team includes CEO Eric Gries, previously with XACCT Software and Compuware, and CTO Marc Krellenstein, formerly with Elsevier and Northern Light Technology. In addition to Marc, the founding technical team consists of key committers with a history of significant contributions to the project and widely acknowledged by the community as instrumental in the continued adoption of Lucene/Solr technologies. These include Erik Hatcher, Grant Ingersoll, and Yonik Seeley. Doug Cutting, the creator of Lucene as well as Nutch and Hadoop, is the Chairman of the Technical Advisory Board for the company, along with a host of other open source and enterprise search experts.

“Lucene has achieved its current popularity and level of adoption because it is open source and because of the strengths of the technology,” said Doug Cutting. “These strengths include its flexibility, out-of-the-box relevancy ranking, query performance and scalability. Both Lucene and Solr are quite robust and ready for the enterprise, but can benefit from what a commercial company can bring to bear, including commercial-grade support and services to make the software easier to deploy and maintain.”

“Lucid Imagination is at an exciting intersection of two high-growth trends – open source software and enterprise search,” said Eric Gries. “With search becoming a ubiquitous, business-critical requirement for enterprise intranets, e-commerce and virtually every web site, Lucene/Solr presents a compelling alternative to pricey, proprietary solutions. We believe the enterprise-grade support and services from us will further expand the adoption of Lucene/Solr.”

“I look forward to using our collective experience and expertise to help search application developers,” said Yonik Seeley, the creator of Solr. “Being part of a company dedicated to enhancing and supporting Lucene/Solr technology means that actively contributing to these projects is a core part of my job and that of the other committers.” Yonik recently contributed technology for distributed search in Solr and significant improvements in Solr faceting performance.

Through the Lucid Imagination knowledge portal, the company offers:

• Free Certified Distributions – Developers looking to improve on the reliability and predictability of their environment can now download complete, tested distributions of Solr and Lucene backed by a 30-day “Get-Started” support, at no charge.
• Support Subscriptions – Companies can purchase one of several commercial-grade support subscriptions for certified distributions as well as for the Apache versions, both at the same price.
• Training and Certification – Lucid Imagination’s training, certification and education programs are offered as regularly scheduled three-day classes or as customized, on-site engagements.
• Consulting Services – Lucid Imagination’s high-level consulting services are customized, short-term engagements.
• Value-added Software – Lucid Imagination offers tools for Lucene and Solr. One such tool available now is Solr Gaze, an open source visual framework for monitoring Solr performance.

Lucid Imagination recently received $6 million in Series-A funding from Granite Ventures and Walden International with equal contributions from each company (please see press release, “Lucid Imagination Announces $6 Million Series A Funding from Granite Ventures and Walden International,” January 26, 2009).

About Lucid Imagination

Lucid Imagination is a commercial company dedicated to Apache Lucene technology. The company provides free certified distributions, commercial-grade support, training, high-level consulting and value-added software for Lucene and Solr. Lucid Imagination’s goal is to serve as a central resource for the entire Lucene community and make them more productive. Lucid Imagination is a privately held venture-funded company. The investors include Granite Ventures and Walden International and its customers include AOL, Apple, Comcast, and Zappos.

Lois Paul & Partners
Alicia Libucha, 781-782-5703
Alicia_libucha@lpp.com