I noticed a bit of news from Mark Logic, one of the key vendors we evaluate in the Publishing Tools section of our XML & Component Content Management research. It seems that they have secured a further $12 million in venture capital funding, no mean feat in today's credit crunching economy. Particularly so as Mark Logic is probably one of the most misunderstood vendors in the entire content technologies sector. Potential buyers often mistake Mark Logic as a content management or search system, and those with longer memories remember and position Mark Logic as an XML database vendor. In fact the MarkLogic Server is something of all these things, and is a fairly unique offering that makes primary use of XQuery for complex publishing scenarios (comparable in many ways to EMC's Dynamic Delivery Services).

The need to support complex, component-based publishing is growing, and is likely to continue growing in importance over time. Yet at the present time component content management remains a highly fragmented and poorly understood sector. We try and do our bit at CMS Watch to make sense of it for you the buyer and user of this technology. Doubtless some of that $12m will go toward better messaging and product articulation from Mark Logic. That said, all the vendors in this space could probably use some refreshing -- particularly in developing more business-friendly user interfaces -- for the field to really take off.