For more than sixteen years, Virtual Research Associates (VRA) has provided state-of-the-art, integrated web-based software tools that support interactive analysis and intuitive display of news and other text in the form of graphs, tables, and maps for government, international and regional organizations, NGOs, industry and academia.
VRA assists organizations detect early warnings about potential international "hot spots," assists companies succeed in the arena of global enterprise, alters travelers to areas of turmoil as it develops and works with organizations to monitor, track and mitigate threats to personnel security.
Political and economic uncertainty has increased awareness of the vulnerability of financial markets and business operations. VRA was founded in 1996 to further develop and exploit advances in natural language technology required for events analysis and predictive modeling.
The VRA Knowledge Manager is comprised of a set of tools designed to monitor, manage and analyze news and field reports, and includes a patented natural language text processing technology and web-based modules used to assess the real-time evolution of conflict situations around the world. VRA's tools and services have been used by the various branches of the U.S. and foreign government agencies, as well as nongovernmental, regional, and international governmental organizations.
VRA seeks to bring the next level of automated conflict monitoring and political risk analysis to international finance, commerce, and communications firms and organizations whose interests depend upon an accurate assessment of trends in conflict interactions vis-a-vis a real-time, flexible, user customizable, intuitive and cost effective system. With the power to know the social, political, cultural, and economic costs of conflict, the leaders of the next generation of multinational corporations will have the power to confidently navigate their firms through the uncertainties of the emerging globalized economy.