News Releases

3/23/2010

GazoPa Bloom, Flower Community Site, Begins Private Beta Testing

SAN FRANCISCO – March 23, 2010 – Hitachi America, Ltd., today announced that their newly developed flower community site, GazoPa Bloom, is entering private beta testing. GazoPa’s similar image search technology is integrated in this site, and users can search for flowers by uploading flower photos that are unfamiliar to them. Utilizing similar image search technology, users can find candidate flowers and can also ask other users to help them identify these flowers through an online community.

Users can gain access to the private beta testing by requesting invitations at http://bloom.gazopa.com. Access information will be provided for accessing beta test site.

GazoPa Bloom is much more than just a flower search site, GazoPa Bloom allows users to share their knowledge of flowers as well as flower photos. Users can upload their flower photos and share them with other users, while also sharing their knowledge of flowers such as the best times and places to plant them and origin, etc. These features enable users to communicate with each other via flower photos.

GazoPa Bloom is the first application that uses GazoPa’s similar image search technology applied to a specific category of images. Hitachi plans to release future applications that utilize similar image search technology in the future.

For detailed information about GazoPa Bloom, please visit http://bloom.gazopa.com.

ABOUT GazoPa Bloom

GazoPa Bloom is a flower community site that enables users to search, discover and share flower information. GazoPa’s similar image search technology enables users to search for flower names by uploading flower photos that are unfamiliar to them. Users can also share flower knowledge as well as flower photos. http://bloom.gazopa.com.

ABOUT GazoPa

GazoPa is a web image search engine service released by Hitachi that uses features from an image to search for and identify similar images. In addition to images found using keyword searches, GazoPa enables the use of users’ own photos and drawings, and images found on the web, as search keys to locate similar images from our database. In addition to supporting photos, GazoPa also supports the search of video thumbnails. http://gazopa.com.

ABOUT HITACHI

Hitachi America, Ltd., headquartered in Tarrytown, New York, a subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd., and its subsidiary companies offer a broad range of electronics, power and industrial equipment and services, automotive products and consumer electronics with operations throughout the Americas. For more information, visit www.hitachi-america.us. For information on other Hitachi Group companies in the United States, please visit www.hitachi.us.

Hitachi, Ltd., (NYSE: HIT / TSE: 6501) is a leading global technological and industrial company with total revenues of ¥10,000 billion ($102.0 billion) for the year ended March 31, 2009. Hitachi’s business is highly diversified, encompassing operations in the following seven segments: Information & Telecommunication Systems; Electronic Devices; Power & Industrial Systems; Digital Media & Consumer Products; High Functional Materials & Components; Logistics, Services & Others; and Financial Services. For more information on Hitachi, please visit Hitachi's website at http://www.hitachi.com.