Tuesday, February 3. 2009

Space-Time Insight: Geographic Visualization of Data Anomalies for Corporate Benefit

VentureBeat notes that Space-Time Insight (STI) has just received first round funding for its data modeling/visualization business. The company's technology pinpoint data anomolies (power outages, weather events and the like) and helps visualize them on satellite imagery (not sure why that necessarily better than vector data, but it's clearly an important distinguisher for the company). The tools can do predictive modeling and recommend response actions. It may sound a bit fuzzy, but several big companies are already clients: Entergy, Sempra Energy and non-profit grid operator California ISO, Johnson & Johnson and medical vendor Novartis. The last two are interested in it to manage supply chain issues.

VentureBeat is high on the company but expect rivals to appear: "For now, there is no major competitor in the space, but geographic data visualization is picking up steam and could produce a rival soon, especially as more renewable electricity systems are built with advanced monitoring functionality in mind."

Podcast: Three Paths to Open Source Geospatial

Open source is in the news again. This past week the US Dept. of Defence announced Forge.mil, an open source project repository akin to SourceForge. Last month President Obama tapped Sun co-founder Scott McNealy to prepare a document on open source and its potential role in government. But what of open source GIS? How is that corner of geospatial being funded and groomed for growth? We'll look at three paths that have lead to open source growth and their likelihood for success in the coming months and years.

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