Ep. 362: Is data mapping a crystal ball?

Guest: Will Cadell, CEO of Sparkgeo

Maps – try to go anywhere without them.

You can get to places for sure, especially if the terrain is familiar. However, venture outside of your familiar neighbourhood and then your journey is one of trial and error. You wonder what is over there or over there or there and with each foray, you discover something new – new, but not necessarily helpful.

Data is a form of mapping; so is remote satellite imagery. Now combine the two and your understanding of that place expands exponentially – not just the place as a static point in time, but minute by minute. Imagine the power to retailers, governments, insurance companies and others in knowing not just the place, but the place and minute-by-minute historical activity. It’s as if Heisenberg’s “Uncertainty Principle” suddenly became certain, namely you can now know the location and speed of an object.

The power of the information also arms the holder of it with prescient knowledge – in other words, the ability to predict what will come next. It’s a mind boggling concept and if Sparkgeo, a Prince George, British Columbia company, continues to deliver on the promise of marrying low earth satellite imagery with trillions of bits of information into powerful diagnostic tools, then the holder of that information will be armed with a reliable looking glass.

Stuart McNish invited Will Cadell to join him for a Conversation That Matters about the power of accurate time-, space- and velocity-based intel.