Overseas markets beckon for 
The Mole

Wellington developer eyes the United Kingdom following its partnership with IBM NZ.

RANDAL JACKSON, Wellington
29 October 2004

Hyperbolex CEO
Ted Thomas: aiming
at government and
intelligence markets

Wellington-based developer Hyperbolex is at the technical presentation stage with venture capitalists in the United Kingdom as it seeks to raise capital to expand export business for its content analysis tool, The Mole.

The company has already formed a partnership in New Zealand with IBM, which has included The Mole in the latest version of its enterprise search software for unstructured data, codenamed Masala, which is due for release in the next few months.

The Mole enables the user to discover information using intuitive processes, and to abstract significant content to derive meaning.

Chief executive Ted Thomas says Hyperbolex has chosen the UK as its first overseas base because there is a good understanding there by investment funds of the potential of the technology. “Some of the funds have already invested in similar space.”

He says the company has a management team, including a CEO-designate, ready to go in the UK. “Our CEO-designate is UK-domiciled and is experienced in establishing enterprise-class technologies.”

That’s where Hyperbolex has been moving The Mole over the past couple of years, into an enterprise-class product, which Thomas describes as the ability to deploy at an infrastructural level and which can integrate into disparate information repositories.

“We’re looking at opportunities that can drive use into large-scale applications, particularly into government and intelligence-type units. A number of intelligence agencies are looking at The Mole for text mining,” he says.

Currently, Hyperbolex has 16 customers, with 500 users, in government, legal and commercial businesses.

Once the UK business is funded and operational, Hyperbolex has plans for the US market where it has had initial discussions with a potential partner.

The Mole came from PhD work done at Otago University 15 years ago by Roy Anderson, who was researching in linguistics and information science. Just over three years ago he approached a local venture capitalist, who employed the principals of Hyperbolex to do due diligence.

The risk was perceived as too high but they, in turn, approached Anderson, offering to provide the management resource to commercialise the product and to raise initial angel funding. Hyperbolex was then formed, with Anderson contributing to the ongoing development.

About Upshot Technologies (formerly Hyperbolex)

Upshot Technologies develops and licenses enterprise intelligence automation technologies The Mole used in the discovery of information from unstructured data sources. The Mole uses a powerful patented  content analysis technology to provide abstracts of information based on a user's area of interest. The Mole's unique ability to unlock the value within unstructured data and automate processes around this information differentiates it from its competitors.

You can find out more information about Upshot Technologies and The Mole by contacting us at www.themolesite.com or email .