Riya Launches Visual Search Engine Like.com

WebKnowHow
Wednesday, November 8, 2006; 08:46 AM

Visual computing company Riya launched Like.com, a search engine that, for the first time ever, allows consumers to search for items by appearance instead of just text. Riya stated this "Likeness Search" dramatically improves the ease of finding aesthetic or hard-to-describe items on the Web. Clicking on a photo of an item at Like.com will compare that item's shape, color, and texture to millions of other items found on the Web and display the best matches.

Like.com's initial release will focus on several aesthetically-oriented shopping categories -- handbags, jewelry, shoes, and watches -- allowing users to search and purchase items from thousands of leading and boutique brands from retailers such as Amazon, eLUXURY, ICE.com, Lands' End, ShoeBuy, and Zappos. Like.com is adding new inventory at a rate of 30,000+ items a day and will add more shopping categories such as clothing and home decor in the near future. In addition, the first 10,000 Like.com shoppers will receive free shipping on their first purchase from any of the site's featured retailers.

"A picture is worth a thousand words, and it is much easier to shop and search by clicking on pictures than by typing complex search terms," said
company CEO and co-founder, Munjal Shah. "Like.com is the first major new innovation to come to the world of image search in the last five years.
Now, Web searchers will no longer have to rely on the tags that may or may not be attached to a given photo or product image."

Today, image search accounts for eight percent of all Web searches(Google and Yahoo! receive over 270 million image searches per month, according to Hitwise), but these applications only utilize the words attached to photos in order to generate search results. In contrast, Like.com's visual search looks inside the photo and creates a digital signature that describes the photo's content and enables a more accurate search for similar looking items - ranging from your dream engagement ring to a clutch and pair of heels that perfectly complement a hard-to-match patterned dress.

Key features of Like.com include: Likeness Search - the ability to search by image instead of text; Like Detail - finds items that have a specific feature you like (such as a buckle, straps, bezel, etc); Like Color - find color variants of the item you desire; Like Celebrity - find clothing, shoes and accessories similar to those worn by your favorite celebrities; Like Upload - the ability to upload your own photo of your favorite item and find the same or similar products, coming soon.

Riya was founded in August 2004 and has assembled one of the largest visual computing research teams in the world. Its mission is to simplify search and ecommerce by harnessing the latest breakthroughs in visual computing. It has almost one dozen patents pending in the areas of visual recognition and search. Riya has raised $19.5 million from venture and private equity investors, including Bay Partners, BlueRun Ventures, and Leapfrog Ventures.