Silver Spring, MD, USA -- The third edition of the Enterprise Search Report finds that -- despite widespread predictions of consolidation in the enterprise search marketplace -- buyers face myriad supplier choices with look-alike features, while new entrants continue to join the supplier landscape.

The report was released today by CMS Watch, an analyst firm that provides vendor-neutral evaluations of content management, records management, enterprise portal, and enterprise search technologies.

Key findings of the report include:

• IBM, Oracle, and Microsoft continue to struggle to rationalize multiple search technologies and strategies. Oracle's "Secure Enterprise Search 10g" product may be the most straightforward offering of the three, but it has not yet seen extensive customer testing.
• Smaller search vendors continue to exploit Microsoft's inability to develop effective search solutions atop SharePoint. Mondosoft, Coveo, dtSearch, and others are likely to continue offering value-added capabilities after the release of Microsoft's new search services in SharePoint 2007.
• Google's search appliance has disrupted the market, but customer testing still often finds the appliance lacking in "tune-ability" and integration capabilities.
• Faceted or "guided" navigation capabilities originally associated with enterprise search vendor Endeca have gone from product differentiator to widespread feature. Customers can obtain faceted navigation capabilities from several low-cost search vendors. Now, the key differentiator is the extent to which a search system can successfully autogenerate a useful set of metadata "facets" with minimal customer intervention.

Based on product tests and interviews with dozens of professionals engaged in enterprise search, the 3rd edition of the Enterprise Search Report features analysis and surveys of more than 30 products across 28 search vendors. It is designed to help enterprises make informed search technology strategies and buying decisions by detailing the strengths and weaknesses of each enterprise search offering.

The report is available for purchase online from CMS Watch.

Stephen Arnold, founder of Arnold IT and a three-decade search and retrieval veteran, served as the Lead Analyst.

Arnold commented on the difference between using Google to search the public web and searching within an enterprise, "The magic of 'Feeling Lucky' on Google.com works because Google is trying to meet the information need of an average user. Information needs within organizations are not average. These needs are highly specific. They change as business demands and customer needs change. They require different types of services at different times."