Seems like it is focused so much on how fast it responds to queries that it forgot that it is extremely important on how good it's responses are. Lucene's main benefit is the huge library of token filters to improve the understanding of the text in index. Manticore only has an ability to plug your own single filter in. And while that doesn't make it any less possible to make search results good, it's definitely a lot harder to do. Producing good results is the main goal of search, speed is only necessary for it to not be too slow. A well working search will offset any extra infrastructure that it might need to run fast.