We have invited executives from top GeoSpatial companies to share their thoughts about the industry trends, forecasts, and predictions for 2017. http://geoawesomeness.com/topics/geotrends/

1. 1www.geoawesomeness.com

2. GEO TRENDS
REPORT
The new year symbolises the beginning of new start and
an arbitrary point in time where the earth has completed
yet another lap in its marathon around the Sun. It always
evokes the feeling of a fresh start and change.
Speaking of new beginnings, we at Geoawesomeness have
always loved talking to other GeoGeeks and listening to
their thoughts on where the industry is heading. Instead
of letting these conversations just reside in our private
spheres, we invited them to share their thoughts and vi-
sions with the entire Geoawesomeness community.
We are thankful to each and every one of our guests who
took the time to pen their thoughts and agreeing to be
part of the #GeoTrends idea!
We hope you enjoy reading these thoughts and visions, just
as much as we have. Happy reading!
01www.geoawesomeness.com

3. TABLE OF CONTENT
What Were the 4 Key Trends in 2016? ....................................................... 03
Key Industry Milestones in 2016 ................................................................... 04
2017 Predictions ................................................................................................. 07
The Five Gis Trends That Are Changing the World ............................. 08
Geo in 2017 ........................................................................................................... 09
Automotive Mapping Takes Off .................................................................... 10
Next Generation of Gis Is Here! ..................................................................... 11
What Will Happen Across the Geo Industry in 2017 …......................... 12
8 Crazy Predictions for Geospatial in 2017 ............................................ 13
The Essential Element for Location-based Games in 2017 …......... 14
2017 – the Year of Collaborative Mapping ............................................... 15
Geospatial Rising and Falling Stars for 2017 ........................................... 16
Geo Is Behind Every Corner, Even if You Don’t Expect It ................… 17
Artificial Intelligence Set to Accelerate in 2017 ...................................… 18
The Future of Earth Observation ..............................................................… 19
www.geoawesomeness.com

4. 03www.geoawesomeness.com

5. KEY INDUSTRY MILESTONES IN 2016
JAN 16, 2016 FEB 19, 2016 MAR 3, 2016 APR 20, 2016 MAY 13, 2016
Founder and CEO of Foursquare
Dennis Crowley steps down as the
company seeks to restart growth
According to FAA rule all hobby
drone owners in the US must be
registered.
PrecisionHawk raises $18M to bring
drone safety to the next level
Mapillary – the crowdsourced
Street View start-up raises $8M
Apple invested $1 billion
in Dixi Chung - Chinese Uber
04www.geoawesomeness.com

6. KEY INDUSTRY MILESTONES IN 2016
MAY 19, 2016 MAY 24, 2016 JUN 8, 2016 JUL 6, 2016 AUG 1, 2016
Apple opens Maps production
unit in Hyderabad, India with
4000 employees
PwC - one of the biggest
consulting companies in the
world goes live with its drone
mapping unit
Pokémon Go, the location-based
augmented reality game developed
is released and in a few month gets
500 million downloads.
Lenovo announced the first phone
with Google Tango
Uber quits China and sells business in
the country to its rival Didi Chuxing
05www.geoawesomeness.com

7. KEY INDUSTRY MILESTONES IN 2016
AUG 24, 2016 SEP 19, 2016 OCT 18, 2016 DEC 19, 2016
TripAdvisor – one of the largest
online hotel booking platforms,
acquired a popular mapping app
Citymaps
Google acquires Urban Engines to
better understand location-based
big data
After 17 years of development & delays
European GNSS - Galileo is finally live
(although not fully operational)
Alibaba invests in PlaceIQ – loca-
tion-based targeting start-up
06www.geoawesomeness.com

8. 07www.geoawesomeness.com

9. THE FIVE GIS
TRENDS THAT
ARE CHANGING
THE WORLD
Read more about the 5 GIS trends that are
going to the change the world according
to Jack Dangermond, the president and
founder of Esri.
“The geospatial industry is quickly evolving
because the capabilities of digital connectedness
and collaboration are moving ahead
exponentially. In fact, the five biggest trends
in the area of geographic information system
(GIS) technology are centered on making data
more accessible and creating context to visualize
this data in an age when fast, easy access to
information is taken for granted.”
JACK DANGERMOND
President, Esri Inc.
08www.geoawesomeness.com

10. Read more about Javier’s thoughts about
where the Geospatial industry is headed in
2017.
GEO IN 2017
“The next 1 Million users to start using geospatial
technology in 2017 will not even know what
GIS is. Location Intelligence will be delivered
seamlessly via their apps, embedded in Data
Analytics space, as a new software segment,
or integrated on general purpose tools and
platforms.”
JAVIER DE LA TORRE
CEO, CARTO
09www.geoawesomeness.com

11. AUTOMOTIVE
MAPPING
TAKES OFF
Read more about Jan’s predictions for the
future of autonomotive mapping.
“2017 might be the year where we see more
machine-generated edits to maps than human
edits. With constant improvements in deep
learning technology, we may soon get to a point
where digital editors are annotating maps more
efficiently than teams of humans ever could.”
JAN ERIK SOLEM
CEO, Mapillary
10www.geoawesomeness.com

12. NEXT
GENERATION
OF GIS IS HERE!
Read more about Andy’s predictions about
the what the future holds for GIS
“Integrating IoT data, mapping drone information,
analyzing imagery from small sats – GIS is at the
root of these technology trends, and we are only
beginning to really understand how these new
sources of information can help us make better
decisions.”
ANDY DEARING
CEO, Boundless
11www.geoawesomeness.com

13. Read more about Tim’s predictions for Geo
industry in 2017.
WHAT WILL
HAPPEN
ACROSS THE
GEO INDUSTRY
IN 2017
“The value of the ‘where’ is fueling innovation
and entrepreneurialism. Last year we saw the
fusion of augmented reality and geospatial
data creating the global phenomenon that
was Pokemon. In 2017, we’ll continue to see an
explosion of augmented reality apps based on
location context.”
TIM BARBER
VP Software Solutions,
Pitney Bowes
12www.geoawesomeness.com

14. 8 CRAZY
PREDICTIONS
FOR
GEOSPATIAL
IN 2017
Ready to read Matt’s 8 (crazy) predictions
for Geospatial in 2017? Here’s the link.
“Let’s get crazy. None of your safe boring
predictions. No going off into outer space either.
Reality. At least our sense of reality.”
MATT SHEEHAN
Founder, WebMapSolutions
13www.geoawesomeness.com

15. Read more about Peter’s thoughts about
Location-based Games in 2017.
THE ESSENTIAL
ELEMENT FOR
LOCATION-
BASED GAMES
IN 2017
“The future of location-based games will be
dominated by those who take advantage of the
on-demand contextual data available on each
user’s device. The mixing of each individual user’s
reality with the overall fantasy of the game will
not only make for more engaging games but far
more personal experiences.”
PETER WITTIG
Co-founder, Motive.io
14www.geoawesomeness.com

16. 2017 – THE
YEAR OF
COLLABORATIVE
MAPPING
Read more about Dino’s prediction that
collaboration is key to GIS industry in 2017
“ It has never been easier to take the idea of
GIS and mobile data collection to more people
in organizations, as so many are educated by
basemaps and games like Pokémon Go!. The key
requirement is GIS that can actually deliver such
simple, easy and high-quality user experience to
enterprise users.”
DINO RAVNIĆ
CEO, GIS Cloud
15www.geoawesomeness.com

17. GEOSPATIAL
RISING AND
FALLING
STARS FOR
2017
Read more about Ryan’s rising and falling
Geospatial stars for 2017.
“In a world with self driving cars, artificially
intelligent home assistants, and popularity of
games like Pokemon Go, the world of GIS and
Location Based services is on a convergence path
with macro-technology trends.”
RYAN GOODMAN
CEO, CMaps Analytics
www.geoawesomeness.com 16

18. Read more about the factors that Ernest
thinks are transforming the industry.
GEO IS
BEHIND EVERY
CORNER, EVEN
IF YOU DON’T
EXPECT IT
“Is “GIS is everywhere” a redundant statement?
Aside from the rather poor (though literal) pun,
I argue that it is redundant. I propose that GIS is
currently going through a renaissance period of
explosive growth, though perhaps not in the most
obvious of ways.”
ERNEST EARON
Founder & CTO, PrecisionHawk
17www.geoawesomeness.com

19. ARTIFICIAL
INTELLIGENCE
SET TO
ACCELERATE
IN 2017
Read more about the AI processes that are
happening at TomTom.
“Maps have existed for thousands of years
and are still evolving to continue meeting
users’ diverse and changing needs. Part of this
evolution is the level of details included in the
maps; geometry and street names alone are no
longer sufficient, and in recent years, additional
attribution has been added to maps to enhance
the user experience. To facilitate this attribution,
TomTom is developing new, innovative tools, such
as Artificial Intelligence to speed up the process
of map development and updates.”
PIETER GILLEGOT-
VERGAUWEN
VP Product Marketing, TomTom
18www.geoawesomeness.com

20. THE FUTURE
OF EARTH
OBSERVATION
Read more about the future of Earth
Observation
“Earth Observation is now heading towards a
revolutionary model where all data is immediately
available, all analysis is performed in near real-
time as the data is acquired, and the distribution
of the imagery analysis results are streamlined
straight into users hands through apps and other
channels, ready to be put to work.”
DR. KEITH BECKETT
Chief Scientist, UrtheCast
19www.geoawesomeness.com