[London, ENGLAND] It is only 6 weeks old and it has already had
investment of nearly US $6 million, but search and procurement
portal engine SearchandMatch has just received another million
pounds (US $1.42 million) from British entrepreneur Bob Morton.
Morton, who is chairman of Harrier Group plc (and, for that
matter, also of Baron Corporation plc, Vislink plc, Incepta Group plc,
Planit Holdings plc, Systems Union Group plc, Clarity Group plc,
BsoftB plc and InterClubNet plc) has great faith in the new
product.
“The SearchandMatch tool will revolutionize information retrieved
on the Internet as we know it, being highly flexible and relevant
to all market sectors,” said Morton.
So what does SearchandMatch do exactly? According to information
issued by the SearchandMatch Limited it currently “allows the instantaneous
appraisal and matching of software needs on over 100,000 software
application products and from 7,600 suppliers.”
Divided into 340 recognized business and industry sectors, SearchandMatch
holds details on over 1,500 different software application areas.
Updated daily, it lets the user search the database quickly
according to specific criteria.
Among early adopters of SearchandMatch are Centrica plc, DHL,
the European Patent Office, ICI, Lloyds TSB Development Capital
and Unicorn Systems.
SearchandMatch says it will expand its portal over the next 6
months to include data on 300,000 products from 45,000 suppliers
— serving Europe and the United States as well as the U.K.
Keeping data on so many products up-to-date will be a major
task, but SearchandMatch appears confident that it will offer
valid information to all its customers.
Morton’s investment decision is supported by recent findings
of the Aberdeen Group, which predicts that 90 percent of purchasing
professionals will be conducting transactions over the Internet
by 2002.
