Thursday, October 30. 2008

Google to Sponsor, Provide Keynote for daratechPlant 2009

Daratech, based here in Cambridge, is known for its market reports on PLM, CAD/CAM, CAE, CDM, MPM and GIS. (If you don't know the first few acronyms, don't worry, the folks who do are not too savvy about GIS!) Today I see that Google will not only sponsor daratechPlant, an event focussed on "plant asset lifecycle management," Aidan Chopra, Product Evangelist, Google SketchUp will give the keynote (press release).

Chopra will provide the daratechPLANT audience with an insider’s view on Google’s work in the 3D and geospatial arena, and what might be coming next. He will address how ideas like real-time collaboration, cloud computing and mobile access to information will affect the way companies deal with 3D data, some of the challenges involved in working with 3D information, and how they might be overcome.

So, it sounds like Google is delving further in 3D, beyond just 3D design into many of those acronyms introduced above. It's been my experience that Daratech events are very much "pay to play" so I'd have to guess that Google paid to get this slot. That tells me its even more likely the company will have something to say.

The conference is February 23 – 25, at the Hilton Americas in Houston, so many of the oil and gas folks are within driving distance.