Convera Launches Taxonomy Developer Certification Program with Ten Partners; Program Helps Convera Customers Deploy Categorization Solutions Tailored to Business Needs.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

VIENNA, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 24, 2003

Convera (Nasdaq:CNVR) today announced that it has certified ten partners as part of its new Taxonomy Developer Certification Program.

Under the program, Convera trains and certifies IT and knowledge management professionals in the development and deployment of custom taxonomies and classifications using Convera's new RetrievalWare(R) Categorization and Dynamic Classification product.

Participants who completed the five-day certification program include Access Innovations, Advanced Technology Systems (ATS), Bleuphish, Creative Technology Inc., IBM Italia (NYSE:IBM), KAPS Group LLC, Mitre, MZM Inc., SRA International Inc. (NYSE:SRX) and Veridian Engineering (NYSE:VNX).

Convera's RetrievalWare Categorization and Dynamic Classification (CDC) product is a component of the RetrievalWare platform and represents a breakthrough in information management.

Leveraging Convera's unique semantic network infrastructure and natural language processing, CDC allows organizations to create and deploy taxonomies that enable users to browse intuitively through vast amounts of information.

Taxonomies are packaged as modular "cartridges" that easily plug into Convera's RetrievalWare platform for high performance search, categorization and dynamic classification.

Certified Taxonomy Developers will serve as consultants and service providers to assist Convera customers in understanding their information management needs, organizing their information in a way that best serves their objectives, and developing well-tuned taxonomies for use with Convera software.

Certified Taxonomy Developers also will have the opportunity to market cartridges that they have developed within the Convera customer base as pre-built taxonomies. Participants in the program have a jump-start with Convera's new Categorization and Dynamic Classification product.

"Access Innovations chose to participate in Convera's Certified Taxonomy Developer program because of the remarkable fit of our services and products to Convera's customer base," said Marjorie Hlava, president and chairman, Access Innovations. "After participating in the training and certification phase, we are more certain than ever that Convera's new Categorization and Dynamic Classification feature will meet the needs of the most demanding customers."

Access Innovations is a global leader in the information industry and has nearly 25 years experience in thesaurus and taxonomy development.

The five-day certification class curriculum was developed by Convera's Chief Scientist, Dr. Claude Vogel, one of the world's leading authorities on taxonomies and categorization.

The class includes topics such as: the history and theory of taxonomies, standard thesaurus concepts, importing existing taxonomies and thesauri, semantic networks, taxonomy design concepts and strategies, performance benchmarking and analysis, and taxonomy validation and refinement.

During the hands-on sessions, participants use Convera's RetrievalWare Cartridge Editor to import, edit and benchmark taxonomies and classifications.

"This represents a key milestone in the launch of RetrievalWare 8 and our new Categorization and Dynamic Classification product," said Dale Hazel, Senior Vice President of Marketing, Convera. "With this group of strong taxonomy partners, our customers will have a clear path to return on investment through search and categorization solutions that are highly tailored to their industries and business needs."

About Convera

Convera is a leading provider of mission-critical enterprise search, retrieval and categorization solutions. Convera's RetrievalWare solutions maximize return on investment in vast stores of unstructured information by providing highly scalable, fast, accurate and secure search across more than 200 forms of text, video, image and audio information, in more than 45 languages.

More than 800 customers in 33 countries rely on Convera's search solutions to power a broad range of mission-critical applications including enterprise portals, knowledge management, intelligence gathering, profiling, corporate policy compliance, regulatory compliance, customer service and more.

For more information, contact Convera at 800-788-7758, via e-mail at [e-mail] or on the Web at www.convera.com.

For information on Convera's Partners, visit:
Access Innovations, http://www.accessinn.com/
Advanced Technology Systems, http://www.atsva.com/
Bleuphish, http://www.bleuphish.com
Creative Technology, Inc., http://www.creative-tech.com/
IBM Italia, http://www.ibm.com/it/
KAPS Group LLC, http://www.kapsgroup.com
Mitre, http://www.mitre.org
MZM, Inc., http://www.mzminc.com/
SRA International, http://www.sra.com
Veridian Engineering, http://www.veridian.com

This release, including any statements from Convera personnel, contains statements about Convera's future expectations, performance, plans, and prospects, as well as assumptions about future events.

The reader is cautioned not to put undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, as these statements are subject to numerous factors and uncertainties, including without limitation, business and economic conditions and trends; continued success in technological advances; possible disruption in commercial activities caused by terrorist activity and armed conflict, such as changes in logistics and security arrangements; reduced customer demand relative to expectations; competitive factors; and other risk factors listed from time to time in the company's SEC reports.

Actual results may differ materially from our expectations as the result of these and other important factors relating to Convera's business and product development efforts, which are further described in Convera's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. These filings can be obtained from the SEC's website located at www.sec.gov.

Any forward-looking statements are based on information available to Convera on the date of this release, and Convera assumes no obligation to update such statements.

The Convera design logo and the following are worldwide trademarks of Convera: Convera(TM), RetrievalWare(R), and Screening Room(R). The names of actual companies and products mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.