Handshake Software Bolsters Microsoft SharePoint Enterprise Search with Expertise Locator

ALPHARETTA, Ga. - Jan. 22, 2015 - PRLog -- - Handshake Software, Inc. (http://www.handshakesoftware.com), the market leading, award-winning provider of SharePoint-based products and services to the legal market, today announced Handshake Expertise Locator, an add-on application to the popular SP Bridge enterprise search solution. Expertise Locator helps law firms running SharePoint identify expertise by providing rankings based on documents, biographies, contacts, clients, matters, time entries and other content sources. Handshake Expertise Locator early adopters include Foley Hoag LLP with a dozen more firms currently evaluating the Handshake enterprise search enhancer.

While Handshake Software’s SP Bridge is the quickest way to implement enterprise search in SharePoint 2013, its new Expertise Locator product provides firms with additional enterprise and KM search options. Specifically, Expertise Locator empowers SharePoint portal users to easily identify subject matter experts within their organization, leveraging Handshake’s deep understanding of legal line of business systems, native SharePoint 2013 Search and Handshake Software SP Bridge Connector.

Finding Experts with Search Locator Add-on

In order to help determine an individual’s expertise, Expertise Locator factors in document content and semantic analysis, client/matter/contact associations, organizational relationships, case outcomes, and financial factors such as realization and aggregate billings. Expertise searches can focus on niche legal terms of art, citations, industry, geography or any other metadata factor.  Users may drill down on Expertise summaries and evaluate substantiating data points.

“Adding Expertise Locator to our existing SharePoint-based enterprise search solution gives firms a truly robust search product within SharePoint 2013,” noted Douglas Horton, President and CEO of Handshake Software. “We are thrilled to see the legal market’s enthusiasm when it comes to deploying SharePoint 2013 for enterprise search.”

SP Bridge: Handshake Software’s Enterprise Search Cornerstone

“In an effort to provide more flexible Knowledge Management to the various legal audiences within the firm, Foley Hoag selected Handshake Software’s SP Bridge Framework integrated with SharePoint 2013 FAST Search integration and most recently the Expertise Locator application,” said Eliot R. Gorman, Knowledge Management Manager, Foley Hoag LLP. “This combination provides a true enterprise search platform for the entire organization, enabling contextually relevant, actionable and easily accessible information, integrated with the tremendous operational efficiencies already provided by Microsoft SharePoint 2013.”

Mr. Gorman also noted: “In addition to meeting the functional goals of our strategic deliverables, Handshake Software enabled us to abstract our enterprise search, workflow, reporting and KM from the various underlying line-of-business (LOB) systems. This approach allows for a simplified infrastructure and reduces the need to purchase redundant products and professional services from the many disparate LOB vendors, while honoring each system’s security implementation and preserving the various groups’ desire to utilize their respective best-of-breed applications.”

Handshake Software’s SP Bridge enables complete enterprise search in SharePoint 2013 by quickly integrating document, financial, biographical, contact and other firm information and now includes subject matter expertise searching via the new Expertise Locator application.

For more information on Handshake Software and Expertise Locator, go to www.handshakesoftware.com or visit Handshake at LegalTech New York, February 3-5, booth 2010. The complete release can be viewed here (http://www.handshakesoftware.com/company/news/2015/01/han...).