Ordnance Survey sets out to enhance its aerial mapping technologies
Ordnance Survey has signed an agreement with Dstl, to allow it to licence various forms of cutting edge aerial mapping technology.
(Left to right): James Kirby, Ploughshare CEO, Jenni Henderson, Dstl Transformation Director and Nigel Clifford, OS CEO
Ordnance Survey (OS) has signed an agreement with the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl), negotiated by its technology transfer arm, Ploughshare Innovations, to allow it to licence various forms of cutting edge aerial mapping technology.
The main technologies covered by the licence will enable the rapid processing, classification, analysis and extraction of geographic content from satellite and aerial images. The capability could facilitate the efficient production of new types of mapping content of the natural and man-made environments.
Paul Cruddace, OS Technical Change and Innovation Manager said:
We are always looking for opportunities to improve and increase our data capture and processing capabilities – creating new approaches to generating geospatial content. In accessing and applying technology of this nature, the hope is that it will allow us to further optimise our current operations as well as provide new capabilities and geospatial content to current and future customers.
It is a great opportunity to partner Dstl. For over two centuries, OS has continuously invested and innovated in new ways to map the environment. We are looking forward to exploring, trialling and hopefully adopting the latest innovations from Dstl and I am excited to see how they can enhance our processes and geospatial content to provide our customers with premier mapping services.
Ploughshare’s CEO James Kirby added:
This is the latest contract that we have signed which supports the use of technologies developed by the defence and security sectors in other areas. The technology has the potential to improve the speed that maps can be prepared and to enhance their accuracy.
This licencing agreement will enable Ordnance Survey to assess the technologies initially, in order to determine the potential efficiency benefits and enhancements they offer to gathering mapping data, prior to taking a full license.
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