Innovative GIS Solutions for a Sustainable World

Having received the Geospatial World Excellence Award 2014 and Asia Geospatial Excellence Award 2014, Supergeo has once again added new trophies to its honour wall for contributive technologies and widely applied solutions. The relatively young GIS vendor has grown from a small firm with less than 10 employees into a highly influential GIS innovator in the worldwide geospatial industry.

Located in Taiwan, which is one of the most developed countries in terms of information technology (IT), Supergeo is a fast-growing company based on geospatial technologies. Within less than one decade, it has launched SuperGIS total solutions covering desktop, app and cloud platforms, recruited over 30 resellers, and evolved into a leading GIS provider on the global stage.

Super Wang, the founder and CEO of Supergeo, started his first consultancy company in the 1990s using GIS software to run government projects. At that time, he observed that software vendors could not fully satisfy local demands. Users, especially in Taiwan, wanted advanced functionality and customised services for diverse project needs. In 2001, Wang decided to research and develop his own GIS software, SuperGIS, in order to better serve local users.

Broad Market Coverage

After developing the first GIS product, SuperPad (mobile GIS for Windows Mobile devices), in 2003, Supergeo found the entry point for the ArcGIS-dominant market and has achieved great sales results since then. The head-to-head competition with equivalent product lines made a strong impression on new users. The SuperGIS product family now offers broad market coverage, including desktop, server, SDK (software development kit) and mobile apps for Windows, Android and iOS.

SuperGIS software has already assisted users around the world in solving spatial problems related to disaster control, natural resources, land management, urban planning, public health, public safety and the utilisation of 3D technologies. Users are primarily from government bodies, higher educational institutions and private enterprises.

Company Growth

Over the past decade Supergeo has grown in size from 20 employees to 100, and it now has an overseas branch in Malaysia as well as resellers in over 30 countries. Besides the research and development team, the company also operates GIS projects in various domains.

In Taiwan, Supergeo has three partners in the corporate group: TMS, EMTC and BluePlanet, who specialise in developing intelligent transportation systems (ITS), environmental management and digital archives respectively. Supergeo and its partner companies form the largest geospatial group in Taiwan and also an important industry player in Asia as a whole.

Innovative Technologies

Cloud computing has become mainstream, with scalable data storage, efficient data sharing and cost savings for organisations taking GIS technologies to a higher level. In Taiwan, Supergeo firstly helped the Ministry of the Interior to develop Taiwan Geospatial One Stop (TGOS) which gathers comprehensive geospatial data such as up-to-date digital maps and satellite images. 3D and 2D map APIs have also helped numerous sectors to build up their own map websites effortlessly.

TGOS supports catalogue querying, metadata storage and many useful map APIs. Users can create customised mapping applications with a map API to embed in their projects. Government bodies and private enterprises can publish maps and spatial data as GIS services and obtain various analyses without incurring further costs. So far, there are nearly 100 government institutes contributing geospatial data and maps to TGOS, supported by Supergeo, amounting to millions of US dollars of cost savings each year. 

3D Trend

In recent years, a huge leap in 3D technologies has changed the face of the geospatial industry. Responding to that trend, Supergeo released SuperGIS 3D Earth Server. The 3D Server product combines Google Earth-like visualisation effects with GIS functions. It enables users to share 3D data, view GIS data imposed on the surface of a globe and further analyse the conditions using professional GIS technologies. It changes the way that enterprises and governmental users alike use the GIS platform. The 3D product is considered affordable yet powerful enough to give a strong and positive impression and demonstrate technical capabilities, further benefiting decision-making by providing insightful three-dimensional views. 

Customer Needs

For the innovators in the Supergeo Research & Development team, hearing client feedback always stimulates their creativeness. Take SuperGIS Mobile applications, for example. The pricy rugged devices are no longer the only choice for surveyors; Supergeo has seized on the popularity of smart devices, and quickly delivered a solution for Android and iOS users, aside from existing Windows Mobile apps, for easy data collection work. Since the app was launched in March 2014, it has achieved over 3,000 downloads from Apple Store and Google Play. In 2015, more new features will be continually added to the app, such as augmented reality (AR), GPS enhancements, support to external Bluetooth GPS receivers and NTRIP signals and suchlike for advanced field work.

In addition, the Forestry Inventory app announced at Intergeo 2014 originated as a client request. Specially designed for foresters, this task-oriented app integrates the necessary GIS functions, like geotagging, measurement, positioning, querying, data capturing by menus, etc., to enhance the survey efficiency in the forest.

Free Technical Resources

In the professional GIS domain, customised training and rich technical resources are critical to sustain users. The Supergeo GIS Training and Support Centre plays a key role in interacting with users. The centre not only offers professional GIS training courses and technical support, but also publishes GIS tutorial materials for educational institutes worldwide. Meanwhile, the SuperGIS Forum is a platform managed by the centre to solve users' technical problems and promptly acquire knowledge of market needs. The Centre also enables the Supergeo Webinar Team to provide more free GIS resources online, instantaneously demonstrating key features and solutions to users.

Global Network

SuperGIS software resellers can be found from Asia to the Middle East, from America to Europe and also in Africa and Oceania. Important clients include the Ministry of Education in Kuwait, Ministry of Public Works in India, Ministry of Agriculture in Indonesia, several city halls in Italy, SMEs in USA, and universities in Malaysia, to name but a few.

The resellers not only promote SuperGIS software, but also apply the software to various applications in local markets by observing special user requests. More importantly, professional training and close services supported by Supergeo are also available to local users through Supergeo’s global resellers. The company aims to achieve globalisation through localisation, by continually modifying its software based on feedback from users and resellers alike.

Supergeo is constantly looking for partners around the world. Having established its reputation as a leading GIS brand in Asia and built solid relationships within its reseller network, the next step is to focus on deeper operation in the global user network. The company’s objective is to establish long-term relationships with partners and offer enhanced, locally based services to users.

More info on Supergeo here.