Monday, April 10. 2006

LI 2006 - A convergence

LI 2006 seemed to me a convergence of sorts. As the conference chairman, my opinion is obviously biased but my subjective observation is that the event had a similar feel to the original Business Geographics conference in 1993. At that event, geospatial software providers and geographic data vendors met, networked and produced some startling partnerships thereafter. I would suggest that LI 2006 could produce similar results.

Vendors and attendees represented an eclectic mix of technology perspectives. From Immersive Media to Planet 9 Studios to Lucent Technologies, there were some very interesting people roaming the floor. From traditional mapping to mashups, you could not help but see cross pollenization taking place. I'd have to say that if there was a successful conclusion to the event, the reason would be the ability for a variety of technologists to come together in one, neutral venue and talk about their plans to make money with location technology.

Geoff Zeis from Autodesk suggested to me that the conference represented an 'infection point' in the industry. I'm too close to the situation to offer an opinion one way or another. In any technology adoption curve there are inflection points, growth, maturity, but then some other catatlyst must enter to create another inflection point in order for trends to be sustained. I'd like to think that we offered an opportunity for growth to continue and where on the adoption curve we are now is hard to judge. But suffice to say, we will try to break the mold again next year and offer more opportunities to continue the discussion.

Posted by Joe Francica in LI 2006 at 13:32 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0) |

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