Hello from San Diego. Myself and about 14,000 other GIS enthusiasts have gathered here for the week to get the low-down from ESRI staff, business partners, and users on what to expect over the coming year. Read on for this report from the ESRI Telecom & LBS Summit (Day 1)

As I arrived on Saturday, I was fortunate enough to take also take in the 6th annual Telecommunications & LBS Summit. This gathering of mobile developers, wireless carriers and end users served to bring us up to speed on the role ESRI plays in geospatially enabling mobile apps and services.

The day was split into 2 themes – Telecommunications and Location-Based Services (LBS) with presentations then further divided into 2 camps – enterprise solutions and consumer apps. Presentations came from ESRI staff and key business partners developing solutions using ESRI’s location-based solutions like ArcWeb Services (AWS). Those of you not yet familiar with AWS, the solution provide access to GIS content and capabilities, eliminating the need to purchase and maintain large datasets. A subscription provides instant, on-demand access to imagery, aerial photography, raster and vector data sets, and real time incident data like weather and traffic data. Word has it that the next release of ArcWeb Services will come early this fall.

Wireless carriers Sprint and Nextel were on hand boasting of application interfaces with their network capabilities via ESRI’s ArcWeb Services. This enables them to offer customers solutions that locate, track, direct, message, and share information.

Sprint customers can effectively track employees, provide routing and directions, provide SMS and voice alerts, and share information so mobile workers can access enterprise solutions. To carriers like Sprint, the real value of LBS is the realization of increased productivity, cost savings, and customer satisfaction.

Third-party application developers like Aligo are bringing innovative apps to market that provide efficient management of mobile workforce. Users can then answer questions like where are my employees and where have they been?

Canadian carrier Bell now offers their Bell Mobility subscribers a consumer finder service that enables roadside assistance, seek and find, and “mapme” solutions. See www.bell.ca/finderservices/ for more info. Their enterprise customers can take advantage of business tracking solutions. More on this can be found at www.businessonthego.ca. Bell is encouraging developers to learn more about opportunities made available via their LBS Partner Program (http://developer.bellmobility.ca/index.asp). Some existing Bell clients include:
- Canada’s wonderland theme park (moneybag movement tracking)
- City of Vancouver (citizen incident notification system)
- Boomerang stolen vehicle tracking solution

Developers can take advantage of a Bell developer trial lab and apply for application certification via the program.

Trimble’s Rich Rudow introduced us to a cool consumer app from the company called Trimble Outdoors. Think of this solution as an off-road navigation and location-based photo marking, blogging, and trip sharing solution. Offered as a subscription service, the solution lets users leverage ArcWeb Services to plan and route trips, and send routes to your GPS enabled cell-phone. This solution has been designed to let users of Nextel GPS enabled phones to harness the power of GPS. A fine example of what users can accomplish can be seen at Backpacker Magazine (online). Some 100 guides/hikers use the service to plan and map their routes, log waypoints, share photos and comments from their journeys. As a user of this service you have access to nationwide street data, topos, and aerials. Trimble Outdoors is ideally suited for hikers, boaters, geocaching, skiers, cyclists, and other outdoor enthusiasts.

Navteq was also on hand encouraging developers of location-based services to enter the coming LBS Challenge. This popular contest (now in year 3) serves to recognize excellence in application development and can jump start a business very quickly (example, last year’s winner bones in motion). Past participants have been rewarded with free data licensing for their apps, access to venture capital funding, and some have had their apps picked up by leading carriers for inclusion on devices. This year the LBS challenge will double in size with a North American award being highlighted at the March CTIA wireless trade show. A European Challenge will be awarded in February 2006 at the GSM World Congress. See www.lbschallenge.com

Presenters at the summit all seemed to agree that 2006 will likely be THE year for Location-based services!

Monday’s highlights of the User Conference.

Cool news tidbits and announcements from San Diego include the launch of Geographic Imager by Avenza Systems Inc. Geographic Imager is a new plug-in suite for Adobe Photoshop that adds geospatial functionality to this already powerful program. Users can import, edit, manipulate, and export geospatial images such as aerial photography and satellite imagery. See http://www.gisuser.com/content/view/6405/

Applied Minds has announced the introduction of the Touch Table TT45 system designed for Touch Table driven visual analysis, design and collaboration – see touchtable.com. Similarly, Vancouver-based Idelix is attending the show to promote their PDD-enabled Diamond Touch (DT) table, a multi-user, multi-touch device. See www.idelix.com. From ESRI, news of the coming release of ArcGIS 9.1 Business Analysts (with 2005/2010 demographic data) as well as the introduction of ESRI Image Server are hot announcements (official PR yet to hit wire). Developed by MAPS geosystems, this solution provides fast access and visualization of vast quantities of file-based imagery, processed on the fly and on demand. This solution provides for the creation of new web-based solutions. Image server will launch as a stand-alone solution that will support most GIS vendors’ software (GeoMedia, MapInfo, AutoCAD, Microstation). Stay tuned as more reports and news to come from San Diego throughout the week.

In closing, kudos to Victoria-based Latitude Geographics for scoring the back cover of the conference agenda to promote their Geocortex Internet mapping solution (nice job Stephen, my fellow U Vic alum!)

Later from San Diego!
glenn