May 2009
Interview:
‘Now is the time for
dynamic data’
Mark Steele
COO, Asia-Pacific, Tele Atlas
While access to data itself
is an issue in some quar-
ters of the globe, access to
dynamic data seems to be the
need of the hour. What are the
technological and institutional
bottlenecks in getting hold of
real-time data?
Dynamic content is certainly a
key component for the industry
right now. Traffic information for
example is quickly becoming a
“must have” digital map feature,
encouraging daily use of navigation
systems, portals and other
traffic-influenced applications.
As users travel on familiar and
unfamiliar routes, historical, realtime,
and predictive traffic information
enables them to save
time by selecting the least congested
route and increase their
travel-time accuracy. There are
many resources to leverage on
to collect dynamic data and
building powerful and accurate
map products that efficiently
incorporate and enable the
widest range of dynamic data is
critical for success. Additionally,
the solutions for end users must
be in place to ensure delivery of
the content. As a result, we
increasingly see powerful
devices and services that enable
connectivity and our customers
can enhance their revenue and
differentiate their products by
delivering this content into the
car, over the Web and on mobile
devices, enhancing navigation,
mapping, logistics, transportation
planning, and other
location-based
applications.
How is Tele Atlas meet-
ing the regulatory and
security requirements in differ-
ent countries in APAC?
Tele Atlas works very closely
with government regulatory
bodies in various countries in
APAC. For example, in India,
Tele Atlas Kalyani worked closely
with Survey of India to pave
the way for public distribution of
maps. In November last year,
navigable maps created by Tele
Atlas Kalyani were the first to
be screened and approved for
public release by the SOI, in full
compliance with the regulations
of Government of India and the
provisions of the national mapping
policy.
Data access is still a
major challenge in many
parts of the world. Building part-
nerships is one way of overcom-
ing this challenge. What kind of
partnerships you think will help
in APAC region to create data
fast and at a lower cost?
Building partnerships with
government mapping agencies
and private local mapping companies
is definitely required in
many parts of APAC. Tele Atlas
has always applied and
continues to deploy
various partnership
models
to
bring data for new territories
faster to market with more coverage
and richer content. Additionally,
we leverage community
input to update our maps. Community
input helps us tap into
millions of end users who want
to share their changes with us.
We can detect and verify
change and update the map a
lot faster across a broader
geography than ever before. By
adding contributions from individual
map users as an additional
source, we can increase the
total number of changes identified,
particularly in geographically
dispersed and rural areas
either not covered or covered
less frequently by our other data
sources.
How can the user updates
on Map Share be authen-
ticated?
The Map Share community is
unique in that it is already very
active today, driving more than
one million hours each day.
Using information from that
community requires only that
they opt in, and is not dependant
on mobile operators turning
the information over to us. Tele
Atlas has the world’s best validation
processes in place, and
will use our tried and true
processes to check the content
from any source, TomTom users
included.
Our product technology, operations
and quality teams use
quality rules to ensure edits
meet our standards. We also
have the advantage of GPS
measurements which can further
validate and detect
changes.
We do consider MapShare as
powerful and as a complementary
data source next to all the
other data sourcing
approaches applied
by Tele Atlas
such as
field
survey, mobile mapping, secondary
source providers, aerial and
satellite imagery verification.
By comparing multiple sources,
we reach very high confidence
levels in our validation
approaches.
Considering the rapid
increase in the volume of
data and associated issues of
cost of ownership and asset
management, can we think of
data as a service?
Definitely. Data as a service can
be extremely cost-effective for
enterprises. We notice that
quadruple returns on investments
(ROI) are not at all
unusual in enterprise LBS for
example. Enterprises are getting
enormous returns based on
asset tracking, work order dispatch,
remote inventory management,
route optimisation and
other LBS applications.
There are issues of freely
available data from
Google. How does this impact
data providers?
We are in a long-term partnership
with Google and our data are
used in a wide range of their
applications and markets. While
Google provides free data access
to end-users on the basis of their
advertising model, we have viable
business models with Google for
the licensing of our data content.
In addition, Google Maps and
Google Earth created an immense
awareness about the benefits and
possibilities of digital maps and
location-related content, benefiting
the entire industry
Is geospatial data collec-
tion space still ripe for
innovation?
Of course. The world around us
is constantly evolving and we
will continue to evolve to meet
rising needs of our customers. In
fact, we often think about the
future of the mapping industry
and are working to drive this
next generation of digital mapping,
where community based
input and real time data help
create the best experience for
digital map users by providing
fresh maps and dynamic content.
Globally LBS is set to
take off. How is Tele Atlas
geared to meet the demand?
LBS has finally arrived, pioneered
by ROI-driven enterprise
customers and now embraced
by consumers. We have cleared
many of the technology challenges
- most notably the availability
of location information –
and the user interface experience
is getting better by the day.
Mobile advertising is now
becoming a potential source of
revenue and consumers are very
willing to pay for wireless applications.
Other companies such
as Loopt in the US, offer social
networking applications that
embrace location as a key component;
even Google now offers
a social networking application,
Google Latitude. The market
currently has many of these
applications that are free to the
consumer and I think we will
continue to see new applications
leveraging location as the
foundation for or a component
of their applications coming
around the world, with new business
models arising as well.
Tele Atlas is committed to produce
location-based content and
we will continue to innovate to
meet the changing lifestyles and
needs of users worldwide. We will
work with our partners to deliver
the most relevant dynamic content
to them – in the enterprise
and consumer realms.
How does the acquisition
of Tele Atlas by TomTom
affect the competitive position
of Tele Atlas in global market?
Tele Atlas is a global digital map
data and content supplier with a
rich, 20+ year history in the navigation
industry – from developing
the first in-car navigation
system, to creating the first navigable
digital road map of
Europe. We are highly competitive
and have a strong foothold
in the global market by delivering
map data, dynamic content
such as community input, traffic,
and points of interest to developers
of personal navigation,
wireless, Internet, in-car and
business navigation systems. We
serve a wide range of markets.
Our comprehensive lead generation
process and 50,000+ data
sources worldwide is our competitive
advantage in producing
the most accurate and up-todate
maps.
The acquisition of Tele Atlas by
TomTom NV has not changed
our core strategy and that is to
create the best maps as quickly
as possible. We are able to
deliver even more dynamic data,
like speed profiles and traffic,
thanks to the information we are
getting now from the TomTom
community of drivers. With accurate
and rich products, we can
better help all of our partners
globally to create a great experience
for their own customers,
because the maps they are
incorporating in their products
are the new standard for real
time accurate maps and routing
intelligence.
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