Trends in spatial technology 

Users want to integrate spatial capabilities into enterprise information systems, and this basic need drives most new growth in the spatial information management industry. IDC expects spatially integrated enterprise systems to continue to grow and mature over the next several years. During this period, these systems will be driven by broad IT dynamics rather than the specialised requirements that have driven technologies like GIS and CAD in the past.

IDC expects a number of trends to shape spatially integrated information systems for the near and the mid-term. First, increasing awareness of spatial capabilities and their value will increase as consumer-based applications like Google Earth/Maps, Microsoft Local.Live, personal navigation and location-based wireless services become ubiquitous. Enterprise users will come to expect the simple interfaces and performance typical of consumer-oriented systems.

Second, deep integration of all types of data and applications, including spatial, will continue as an imperative in maturing enterprise IT systems. In highly integrated systems, data is continually merged from many sources. This means that information systems have to be designed from the ground up to maintain predictable data quality. The user has to know that the data being used for a particular application is fit for the purpose at the time of use.

Third, commoditisation of basic spatial functions and data will be offset by new requirements for integration with enterprise systems and by requirements like advanced operational analytics and real-time, location-specific and repeatable decisions. At the same time, enterprise IT capabilities like service-oriented architecture, web services and enterprise solutions platforms will make SIM implementations easier and a lower risk for the customer.

Fourth, higher-quality spatial data will be increasingly available from diverse sources such as tracking devices, networked sensors, satellite, aerial and ground-based imagery, and location-specific information extracted from tabular data streams.

Finally, IT governance will become more sophisticated. The aim is to make all enterprise IT systems work together to support business goals. Vendors, systems integrators and in-house implementors will have to adapt traditionally segregated and independent geospatial systems to meet new governance requirements.

Traditionally, utilities have used different information systems like CAD, GIS and ERP to support different processes like design, construction, operations, administration, finance and customer services. Logically, we know that these processes are all related – information from each process is useful in other processes. But until recently, managing data logically across the processes was difficult.

Users need consistent, accurate information about infrastructure and customers across all processes. This means that one version of information is used across processes like planning, design, construction, operations and finance. However, some utilities still use separate systems for each process. In these utilities, common data has to be re-entered in each independent system – a process that inevitably introduces data errors that have to be found and corrected. Still, a predictable percentage of errors go undetected until they cause expensive operational problems.

Information about customers and the infrastructure that they touch must be accurate and continuously synchronized. For example, at German power utility Stadtwerke Augsburg, changes in a customer’s electric connections or capacity are quickly reflected in the customer’s billing records in the utility’s SAP customer billing systems. In addition, utilities need to respond effectively to changing situations like regulation, mergers and natural disasters. While these situations present different challenges, they are each easier to face if the basic infrastructure and customer information is consistent, accurate and accessible.

Integrated spatial information management

Spatial information management, including CAD and GIS, has transformed from a specialist application to a technology with broad relevance within many IT ecosystems. IDC expects technologies like Topobase – Autodesk’s platform for integrating infrastructure design and management, which allows utilities to manage information from planning, design, construction, customer service and ongoing operations in workflows that match the ways that utilities work – to accelerate the use of SIM across most enterprise processes that have location-specific elements. This near-future environment will be shaped by the following five factors:

• An increasing emphasis on enterprise issues such as data quality, security and process-based integration.
• An increased emphasis on geospatial master data within enterprise systems (organisations will maximise and exploit their spatial data and technology resources across their enterprises and external organisations).
• Increasing geospatial capabilities from large internet providers like Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and AOL (the simplicity and ease-of-use found in these consumer-facing applications will influence user expectations).
• Sharply increasing impacts of location-determining technologies such as GPS, RFID, wireless LAN, intelligent networked sensors and cellular networks – technologies that are rapidly becoming ubiquitous.
• Increasing systems and data integration opportunities focused on spatially enabling enterprise information systems.

Case study
Stadtwerke Augsburg 
The city of Augsburg, Germany, was established in 15BC as a Roman garrison. Today, Augsburg is a thriving city with a population over 270,000. Stadtwerke Augsburg is an independent utility company that delivers a wide range of services including gas, electricity, water, district heating and local public transport to Augsburg and its surrounding areas. Stadtwerke Augsburg serves a total of about 350,000 customers.

As one might imagine, delivering such a wide range of services in a historic but growing city is complicated. Stadtwerke Augsburg had, like most utilities, acquired a number of different information systems to handle processes like customer billing, installation scheduling, design, construction, and operations. And like many utilities, the hodgepodge of different systems became harder and harder to manage as the city grew. Today, Stadtwerke Augsburg processes about 200 new construction projects per month, with a backlog of about 500.

“Maintaining our asset data sets cost us a great deal of time and made it difficult for us to respond to customers as quickly as we wanted. We were also concerned about the data quality,” says Juergen Biedermann, a manager in Stadtwerke Augsburg’s central documentation and data processing services department. “With multiple data sets, costly data errors and inconsistencies between systems were inevitable.”

In 1999, Stadtwerke Augsburg started using Autodesk products like AutoCAD Map 3D to handle GIS-related tasks. It was using other Autodesk products for engineering tasks like design and construction. In 2002, Stadtwerke Augsburg acquired Topobase to manage all of its engineering processes. It also linked Topobase to its SAP system for a direct interface with processes like customer billing, asset information, and cost accounting. Oracle is the underlying database for both Topobase and SAP.

“We liked the fact that Autodesk Topobase offered us a way to integrate all our asset data within the Oracle Spatial database and then maintain the data in the normal course of our work,” explains Biedermann. “The whole solution is based on open data. That helps to both protect our investment and use our asset data with other applications, including our SAP customer accounts system.”

After implementing its integrated system, Stadtwerke Augsburg realized that employees without engineering expertise, such as customer service agents, managers, and field crews, would benefit from ready access to the asset and spatial information by speeding business decisions and customer support. Stadtwerke Augsburg turned to Autodesk MapGuide to make the data available over the Internet. Biedermann notes that Autodesk MapGuide has been so successful among desktop users that Stadtwerke Augsburg decided to expand data availability even further. “Using GPS-enabled handheld mobile devices, our field technicians can access the coordinates of all transformer locations,” he says. “If there is a disturbance on a line, they use the information for navigation, which allows them to respond faster.”

Today, Stadtwerke Augsburg has about 350 users for Topobase and MapGuide. Since Topobase has been in operation since 2002, the benefits are accepted as a normal part of business. For example, a ‘Call Before You Dig’ request used to involve five people from three different departments – gas, water, and electric. The customer had to go from department to department to get an answer. Today, there is a central desk, staffed by two people who can answer questions immediately and print the appropriate map on demand. About 60 percent of these requests are handled over the internet.

The list of examples is long, but here are two more that illustrate key points. In 2000, there were 24 people involved in documenting Stadtwerke’s network. Today there are 13 people handling a higher volume of work than the 24 people in 2000 did. According to Beidermann: “We have to compete for our customers. Our customer turnover is only about 1-2 percent. Other utilities around here see a turnover of 5-10 percent. I think that our quick access to information and responsiveness is the main reason. Topobase is responsible for at least 50 percent of that.”