Semantic Web R&D Funding in the Private Sector ISWC 2006 Dr. Mark Greaves Vulcan, Inc. (206)

2 First, the obvious... New sources of national military and economic advantage –Technology superiority / avoidance of technological surprise –Intelligence analysis and public sector decision support Support of public institutions (Universities, Research Institutes, flagship industries) –Education –Basic science for national-scale issues –Citizen interaction with Government Internatonal Leadership and Reputation opportunities Government-unique information problems Developing a profitable salable product –Technology agnostic unless it offers a unique market advantage Favorable ratio of financial reward to market and development risk –Identified, qualified customer base (could be an advertiser base) –Credible ROI (Return on Investment) argument –R&D investments have payoffs in the short term –R&D risk is limited Sustainable advantage in a crowded marketplace –Patents or hard-to-duplicate IP –First mover advantage (eBay) Public Sector Goals for Semweb R&D Funding Private Sector Goals for Semweb R&D Funding

3 Private Sector R&D Funding Types What is cool from a business point of view is rarely equally cool from a technology point of view, and vice versa Traditional corporate internal R&D to support an existing line of business –If you are lucky enough to be in one of these (Boeing, IBM, Lucent, British Telecom, etc.) then you know the upsides and the downsides. –Often supplemented with public sector R&D contracts –Very occasionally will partner with others for specialized R&D Consulting / prototyping for other organizations –Generally, a business of contacts and long sales cycles –Examples: TopQuadrant, ontoprise Venture capital –Semantic web and web 2.0 companies are more difficult for traditional VC firms, because their capital requirements are often modest Content comes from users and web mining Software development is fairly minimal because of leveraging open software Advertiser revenue models don’t require large sales staffs (eyeball aggregation) Exit strategy is a buyout, rather than IPO –Need a VC that Can put a small amount of money to work and understands the technology (9 people and ~1M users!) Understands the technology –Get ready for a wild ride towards a launch

4 What Vulcan is Doing Vulcan is the private asset management company for Paul Allen, co- founder of Microsoft –Development capabilities include philanthropy, externally contracted R&D, internal technology development, venture capital, and private equity –We occasionally issue targeted solicitations Vulcan “skunk works” projects Vulcan IP and technology