Patent ID: 8321458

Claim:
A method, performed by one or more computer processors, comprising: receiving a description for a product design; analyzing the description to determine one or more terms describing the product design; comparing the determined one or more terms to a plurality of stored records; selecting a subset of stored records based on the comparison, the subset of stored records considered relevant to the description of the product design; assigning weights to terms included in each record of the subset of stored records based on relevancy criteria; calculating a score for each record in the subset of stored records utilizing the weights assigned to the terms in each record; selecting a preferred subset of stored records based on scores assigned to each record in the subset of stored records; analyzing each record in the preferred subset of stored records to identify persons associated with each record; applying relevancy criteria to identified persons to determine a list of recommended contacts associated with the preferred subset of stored records, the list of recommended contacts considered to have potential knowledge relevant to the description of the product design; and outputting at least one of the records in the preferred subset of stored records and the list of recommended contacts.