München, 30.7.09: United Maps GmbH gibt den erfolgreichen Abschluss der zweiten Finanzierungsrunde im siebenstelligen Bereich bekannt.

Das bisherige Investorenkonsortium aus High-Tech Gründerfonds, SeedFonds Bayern und SpaceTec Capital Partners erweitert zusammen mit dem ClusterFonds StartUp! nun massiv das Seed-Investment der Gründungsphase. Damit bescheinigen die Investoren United Maps mit ihrer  Technologie großes Potenzial im schnell wachsenden Markt für professionelle Geodaten und stellen mit dieser Finanzierungsrunde weitere Mittel für Ausbau und Vermarktung bereit.

Der im Februar 2008 in München gegründeten United Maps GmbH gelingt es mit einer weiter entwickelten Technologie, die inhaltliche Qualität und Dichte von Vektorkarten zu optimieren. Die aus Navigationsgeräten bekannten und für den Straßenverkehr optimierten Basiskarten der weltweit führenden Hersteller Navteq oder Tele Atlas werden dabei algorithmisch mit weiteren kartografischen Daten flächendeckend kombiniert.

Erstmals wird mit vollständig integrierten und kompatiblen Geometrien multimodales Routing möglich: die nahtlose Navigation über alle Verkehrsmittel, vom Auto in die S-Bahn, in die U-Bahn, die Tram und zu Fuß weiter zum Ziel. Die enorme Inhaltsdichte bietet bisher unbekannte Möglichkeiten für ortsbezogene Medien, Dienste und professionelle Planungsgrundlagen.

Mit den zunehmend in mobilen Endgeräten wie Smartphones eingebauten GPS-Empfängern wird Navigation zum Massenmarkt. Nach Marktschätzungen werden bereits 2011 über 40% der Nutzer von Mobiltelefonen in Deutschland Navigation auf Ihrem Gerät betreiben. Dazu sind bessere und inhaltsreiche Vektorkarten notwendig.  

United Maps hat mit 'UM-DE' nach nur sechs Monaten Produktion das erste marktreife Produkt verfügbar: eine deutschlandweit flächendeckende Vektorkarte in Maßstäben bis 1:2.000.

Continue reading "Bessere Karten für das Geoweb - United Maps..." »

The current consortium of High-Tech Gruenderfonds, SeedFonds Bayern and SpaceTec Capital Partners teamed up with ClusterFonds StartUp! and now massively extends the initial Seed-investment into a Series-A round. Taking United Maps to a next level, the investors substantiate United Maps' technology of algorithmically conflating vector data sets, thus manifesting its potential in a quickly growing market for professional Geodata and Geoservices.

Deploying its technology, United Maps GmbH optimizes quality, density and contents of vector maps. Market leading base maps from Navteq or Tele Atlas - well known from navigational devices made for vehicle traffic - are algorithmically combined and merged with supplemental cartographic data sets. The resulting new and comprehensive mapping products are perfectly fit for mobile and location based use cases.

United Maps premiers completely integrated geometries and fully compatible and routable data sets enabling multimodal routing: seamless navigation across all means of transport, from car to public mass transit and pedestrian options. Content rich United Maps offer new perspectives to LBS (location based media and services), business process optimizing and planning.

With GPS capabilities increasingly being available on mobile devices and smartphones, mobile navigation and mapping will become a mass market trend. Latest estimates see over 40% of German mobile users deploy some form of navigation on portable devices. As better and more informative vector maps are essential for a quick adoption, United Maps sees itself well positioned in a thriving market environment.

After only six months of production, United Maps recently introduced 'UM-DE': a comprehensive, nationwide vectormap in scales up to 1:2'000.

Continue reading "United Maps GmbH announces successful closing..." »

We just sent out a (german) press release announcing UM-DE - and first feedback drops in.

See full text below.

Continue reading "German press release: United Maps stellt..." »

Der High-Tech Gründerfonds, Bayern Kapital und SpaceTec Capital Partners beteiligen sich gemeinsam an der United Maps GmbH aus München. United Maps füllt „die Löcher zwischen Straßennetzen“ mit Gebäuden, Fußwegen, Nahverkehrsinformationen und relevanten, qualitätsgesicherten Inhalten und thematischen Informationslayern.

United Maps produziert voll routingfähige, hoch detaillierte und multimodale Vektorkartografie einer neuen Generation. Die aus der KfZ- Navigation bekannten Basiskarten führender Hersteller wie Navteq, Tele Atlas oder AND werden mit professionell recherchierten zusätzlichen kartografischen Informationen algorithmisch zu neuen Kartenwerken verdichtet.


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United Maps „fills the gaps in road networks“ adding building footprints, pedestrians paths, mass transit information and relevant topical layers.

United Maps GmbH has announced today strategic investments from three organizations: High-Tech Grunderfonds, Bayern Kapital, and SpaceTec Capital Partners. United Maps did not disclose the magnitude of the investments, but said the new funding will support United Map’s effort to produce a new generation of fully routable, highly detailled and multimodal vector maps. -- >>deutsche Version<<

United Maps strategy is to take basemaps - from vehicle navigation market leaders like Navteq, Tele Atlas or AND – and algorithmically match them with value-added cartographic data and relevant information layers thereby conflated into new data products.

Digital cartography and webmapping by Google Earth, Yahoo! Maps or Windows Live Search Maps are fast-growing segments of online usage worldwide. “With the support and funding of our investors, we deploy a disruptive technology and deliver unique map products timed to ride the wave of geodata, geolocation and GPS-based solutions," said Stefan Knecht, CIO and one of the three founders of United Maps. “Our aggregation of diverse datasets is highly automated and delivers more than 90 percent correct matches. Processes and workflows are optimized for international markets and products.“   Continue reading "We're funded. High-Tech Gründerfonds, Bayern..." »

John Nelson from IDV Solutions lists some really serious GIS projects at his Blog 'Designing Composite Applications':

• An alert management system to filter, escalate, and ideally prevent a doomsday scenario in one of the world's largest metropolitan areas.
• An executive research dashboard to provide a geographic means of unifying and presenting specific business data, community involvement, political representation, and populace demographics to quickly compile a background report for more confident, better informed executive visits.
• An interface to navigate the complex world of contractual workflows and provider relationships in the Healthcare industry using geography as the primary metaphor.
• A silverlight map interface to provide first and second responders access to post-Hurricane Ike reconnaissance imagery in order to prioritize relief efforts by identifying areas of greatest impact.
• A Spatial Wiki product where users can go nuts creating and editing a world of geographic data.
• A lightweight GIS editor used by traveling technicians to sketch fiber optic network possibilities in the field.
• A market optimization tool for a database marketing division to visually identify areas of marketing best fit and areas where opportunities for gain are strong by visually slicing and dicing the thematic map elements along a correlation scatterplot.
• A time series platform for a pharmaceutical company to track prescription patterns along time-space in order to recognize trends and proactively identify areas of focus.

BPO at its finest ...

Sometimes some of our hundred monkeys take a break from painting those nifty maps and return to earth.

Earth demands some questions to be answered before investors do. So we collected some ideas on how this emerging neogeography market could develop: What are the drivers and where are the risks?

A graphic was born:

See an enlarged version and please give us your thoughts: what did we leave out? what needs to be corrected? any factors overseen or misworded? Push us, as needed, please.

Continue reading "Drivers & Risks: peeking into the crystal ball" »