[Editor's Note: This article originally included an incorrect link. The correct link to view the 2013 "Top Semantic Start-Up Competition" is http://semtechbizsf2013.semanticweb.com/sessionPop.cfm?confid=70&proposalid=5265".]

The finalists of the 2013 “Top Semantic Start-Up Competition” have been announced. This year’s finalists represent a broad spectrum of entrepreneurship within the world of semantic technology. The announcement states, “At the 2013 Semantic Technology & Business Conference, SemanticWeb.com and WebMediaBrands will award one company the prize as ‘Top Semantic Technology Start-Up.’ At 12:30 pm Monday, June 3^rd, companies will have the opportunity to compete on stage as they deliver their pitches before a panel of expert judges! The companies competing will have met the following conditions: (1) Have a demonstrable product (at least in ‘beta’ stage) in the SemTech and or SemWeb space, (2) Have received no more than a Series B round of financing.”

The finalists are: Read more

This June’s SemTechBiz Conference in San Francisco will bring something new to the table: a full-day tutorial on Building Enterprise Semantic Applications. This highly anticipated tutorial will happen on Sunday, June 2, and it is already filling up quickly. Seating is limited, so be sure to register today in order to reserve your spot.

The tutorial will be taught by Hector M. Perez-Urbina, Senior Research Scientist at Clark & Parsia; Brian Sletten, President at Bosatsu Consulting; and Edgar H. Rodriguez-Diaz, Software Engineer at Clark & Parsia. Read more

[UPDATED: April 18, 2013, 11:46am]

The upcoming Semantic Technology and Business Conference in San Francisco is set to host a thought-provoking panel on RDF as a Universal Healthcare Language. The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) identified the need for a universal healthcare exchange language as a key enabler in addressing this problem by improving healthcare data portability. Many familiar with Semantic Web technology have recognized that RDF / Linked Data would be an excellent candidate to meet this need, for both technical and strategic reasons. Although RDF is not yet well known in conventional healthcare IT, it has been beneficially used in a wide variety of applications over the past ten years — including medical and biotech applications — and would exceed all of the requirements outlined in the PCAST report. Read more

Joshua Sabatini of The San Francisco Examiner reports, “San Francisco has fallen behind in the open-data movement, but city officials say a new proposal will once again put it on the forefront. Three years ago, The City adopted its first open-data ordinance to encourage departments to release their data sets — i.e., restaurant health scores or details on special events in The City. But the effort appears to have wilted, and cities such as New York, Philadelphia and Chicago have since created more aggressive initiatives than San Francisco. ‘Unfortunately we have fallen a little bit behind,’ said Board of Supervisors President David Chiu. ‘We have about 500 city-maintained data sets. But there are literally thousands of data sets that we could put out to the public’.” Read more

icix is looking for a Data Architect in San Francisco, CA. The post states, “The platform team at Icix is looking for a seasoned Architect with strong skills at developing and managing big data. The Data Architect will be responsible for designing the data platform for the icix system which will manage all of the graph data, structured and unstructured data and documents stored and accessible by the icix network. This system must be able to query and manage complex graph data and millions of documents with exceptional performance and ultra high reliability. The Data Architect will also be responsible for working in conjunction with Data Visualization Engineers to build solutions which allow for the search, retrieval, reporting and analytics of the data stored in the data platform.” Read more

There are just two weeks left to apply for the SemTechBiz Start-Up Competition. Entry is free, so hurry and get your submission in! The competition page states, “At the 2013 Semantic Technology & Business Conference, SemanticWeb.com and WebMediaBrands will award one company the prize as ‘Top Semantic Technology Start-Up.’ At 12:30 pm Monday, June 3rd, companies will have the opportunity to compete on stage as they deliver their pitches before a panel of expert judges! The companies competing will have met the following conditions: (1) Have a demonstrable product (at least in “beta” stage) in the SemTech and or SemWeb space. (2) Have received no more than a Series B round of financing. To apply, go to http://wmb.skyworld.com/semtechbizsf2013-su. Please note, that the application deadline is April 1.” Read more

Icix is looking for a Data Architect in San Francisco, CA. According to the post, “The platform team at Icix is looking for a seasoned Architect with strong skills at developing and managing big data. The Data Architect will be responsible for designing the data platform for the icix system which will manage all of the graph data, structured and unstructured data and documents stored and accessible by the icix network. This system must be able to query and manage complex graph data and millions of documents with exceptional performance and ultra high reliability. The Data Architect will also be responsible for working in conjunction with Data Visualization Engineers to build solutions which allow for the search, retrieval, reporting and analytics of the data stored in the data platform.” Read more

Corus is looking for a Senior Software Engineer in San Francisco, CA. According to the post, “This Sr. Software Engineer will work on the development of our expert-system-based cloud hosted Web applications.  We need a versatile self-starter with several years’ experience developing real applications (website or mobile) using Ruby On Rails. Design, develop and maintain cutting-edge Rails applications. Design and deploy a growing cloud-based server infrastructure.” Read more

WHI Inc. is looking for a Senior Software Engineer in San Francisco, CA. According to the post, “We are one of the fastest growing social media websites in the Web today with over 700M monthly page views, 17M global unique visitors and have grown more than 250% in the past year. We do all of this currently with an extremely small team of world class entrepreneurs and engineers. This is a rare opportunity to make an immediate impact at an early-stage startup that has already achieved product / market fit. We are based in San Francisco and backed by world-class investors with deep pockets.  We are looking for a talented, energetic individual with demonstrated excellence in delivering robust solutions based on leading-edge technologies in the field of social media analytics, natural language processing, statistical analysis, data mining and predictive modeling.” Read more

Following successful runs in London and New York City, the Semantic Technology & Business Conference (#SemTechBiz) is returning to San Francisco June 2-5, 2013. Today, we are pleased to announce that the Call For Presentations is open for submissions.

The deadline to enter is January 18, 2013, and we are currently seeking proposals for:

• Conference Sessions – 45 minutes
• Panel Sessions – 45 minutes (must propose moderator and panelists, even if not finalized)
• Tutorials – 3 hours
• Lightning Talks – 5 minutes

What are we looking for?

We are interested in a wide variety of presentations, from business and consumer applications through to fundamental technology discussions.  Over the years, the emphasis of the program has gradually shifted more towards practical experience as Semantic Technologies have matured and gained adoption both on the web and in enterprise systems, so we’re very much looking for semantic case studies and project experience. If you are developing a tool, or using semantics to create an exciting new start-up company, we want to hear from you as well.  Keep in mind that precedence will be given to sessions that offer an interactive element and are designed to provide actionable ideas (get to the heart of the matter!). And having said all that, we still keep time-slots available for cutting edge research and thought-leadership.  So SemTechBiz really is an all-inclusive program for the community.

Read more