(NewsVisual, powered by IntellectSpace) -- In a sign of its financial commitment to building the next generation of Internet-based mobile services, Yahoo! Inc (NASDAQ:YHOO) announce in Las Vegas on Wednesday that it was investing $20 million in the Massachusetts-based start-up company Vlingo Corp, according to several news organizations.
The investment demonstrates what technology Yahoo believes is of paramount importance in order for it to compete in this market against Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG).
Therefore, as part of Yahoo’s new oneSearch 2.0 mobile search services, it formed a partnership with Vlingo Corp, a leading speech-recognition company.
"The companies also announced a collaboration under which Yahoo will use Vlingo to power its move into mobile search, a deal that highlights the industry’s interest in using talking, rather than triple-tapping, to navigate content on cell-phones," The New York Times reported in an online article.
"With the voice-enabled version of Yahoo! oneSearch, consumers can search for anything, including flight numbers, locations, Web-site names, local restaurants, and more, by simply speaking," Yahoo reported in an April 2 press release.
The fact that these two companies aren’t starting their business relationship from scratch makes this joint venture more promising.
NewsVisual decided to create an IntellectSpace Knowledge Map in order to illustrate the business connections between Yahoo and Vlingo Corp.
Most of the connections run through Vlingo Director Robert E Divoli whom the Knowledge Map shows to be linked to a venture capital firm with links to Yahoo named Alliance Bernstein LP. This VC firm has connections to two companies that Mr Divoli served in Senior Executive positions with, Versata Inc and Internet Security Systems Inc.
In addition, the Map indicates that Mr Divoli is also associated through Sybase Inc with a technical designer with strong ties to Yahoo named Sanjeev Dharap.
All of these associations in some way connect Mr Divoli to Yahoo in ways similar to the company’s new business venture with Vlingo Corp; that is, either through an association involving venture capital or through a technical person who specializes in designing Internet-based systems.
There are additional connecting nodes between Yahoo and Vlingo as well.
Todd C Chaffee is connected to Yahoo as a venture capitalist. He is also linked to Mr Divoli through Sybase as a VC. Similarly, Mr Chaffee is link through Nuance Communications Inc to Vlingo Directors Michael S Phillips and John Nguyen.
