Thursday, September 11. 2008

US Military Moves Ahead with BASIC Satellite Plans

The Broad Area Space-based Imagery Collector (BASIC) which we discussed in a podcast is a new vision for government ownership of remote sensing satellites. Talked about for some time, the plan is actually moving ahead. On Monday Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell approved the purchase of two commercial grade satellites (and related launch and monitoring facilities) for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). The deal uses military intelligence funds.

The contract details are still up in the air but it appears the NRO will launch birds with 1.1 meter aperture in about four years at a cost of $1.7 billion. There are no details on resolution. Commercial players are not happy about this move, nor is Pentagon acquisition chief John Young, who says it goes against a presidential directive to use commercial sources whenever possible.

- Reuters

Quote of the Week

"Even though there seems to be a Starbucks on every corner, we have served up 1.7 million Starbucks searches."

- Dan Gilmarting VP of Marketing for uLocate on the success of the company's iPhone apps in an article in Tech News World

The Bizarre Story of the PA 9/11 Memorial and GIS

I'll let you read the details of allegations of the memorial being designed points to Mecca along with alleged threats. I want to draw out just one paragraph from the story in the Daily American News (Somerset County Pennsylvania's paper) because of how it covers the tools used by one professor to explore the directionality issue:

“My assessment has gone from unconvinced to definitely stating that Mr. Rawls does not have a mathematical proof — he has only a calculation,” Griffith said. “I have produced counterexample graphics (employing Mr. Rawls’ own memorial orientation graphic) with both ArcGIS (a state-of-the-art GIS software package) and Google Earth.”

I think it's telling that ArcGIS requires an explanation as an unknown scientific tool and Google Earth requires none. Equally interesting: GIS is not written out, nor defined. The author, who I believe included the parenthetical remarks, clearly feels readers know of GIS if not ArcGIS.

Maptech Sale Complete

I wrote about the sale of Maptech back in April. Now word from a former employee (nothing official) that the company closed its doors on August 29th. The various parts have been divided up among several companies and one product, Pocket Navigator has been discontinued. Of perhaps most interest of the geospatial community:

Maptech’s Land Navigation division, including products such as Terrain Navigator and Terrain Navigator Pro, as well as the popular online Mapserver, has been purchased by mytopo.com. We have also reached agreement to continue to host the historical USGS map collection. For technical support for these products, please email us at ’support@mytopo.com’ or call 406-294-9994. Sales inquiries may be directed to 800-627-7236.

Thanks to reader Brian for the tip.

Northrop Grumman Acquires 3001 Inc.

This was announced yesterday (press release) but I note it here because there were so many press releases yesterday it seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle. NG released no information on the cost, but it seems the well known government contractor is getting more involved in data capture/analysis. This continues the consolidation we've been predicting in the industry in recent months.

3001 Inc. is based in Virginia with offices around the country.