In a landmark development, geospatial industry leaders from across the world came together to announce the formation of the World Geospatial Industry Council (WGIC) at the 8th session of the UN-GGIM (United Nations Global Geospatial Information Management) by Jack Dangermond, Chairman of WGIC and Founder and President, Esri.
WGIC is co-founded by a group of 21 companies, namely AAM Group, AGI India, Autodesk, Bentley Systems, Cyient, Data World, DigitalGlobe (a Maxar Technologies company), e-GEOS, Esri, FARO, Geospatial Media, GeoTech Vision, Ground Truth, Hexagon, IIC Technologies, Oracle, Riegl, Rolta Group, Trimble, TomTom, and Topcon to begin with and its membership is open to commercial companies and representative trade bodies.
WGIC aspires to be a collaborative platform for advancing the role of the geospatial industry and strengthening its contribution in the world economy and society. WGIC endeavors to facilitate the exchange of knowledge within the geospatial industry and co-create larger business opportunities for the geospatial industry. Further, WGIC seeks to raise awareness among policymakers and advocate for better policy environment and investments.
WGIC Chairman and Founder of Esri, Jack Dangermond said, “With WGIC we have the vision to create a new institution that will allow new kinds of partnerships and help geospatial industry to collectively work with big global initiatives such as World Bank and the UN. This will also enable our industry as a whole to have a collective opinion on emerging policies such as those on privacy or geospatial data restriction. I firmly believe that by joining together and exploring collaborative efforts we can make meaningful progress.”
Stefan Schweinfest, Director, United Nations Statistics Division, said: “The World Geospatial Industry Council is a cooperation between leading private sector companies and we are very honored that they chose the United Nations to launch this important initiative. This new and improved cooperation between the industry leadership will also help them to focus and improve their contribution to the United Nations Sustainable Development Agenda.”
Sanjay Kumar, Secretary General and CEO of WGIC, said, “With geospatial industry valued at around $300 billion, the value of ‘where’ is fueling innovation and entrepreneurialism as the convergence with emerging technologies is enabling geospatial capabilities for diverse applications. WGIC aims to strengthen geospatial industry’s partnerships and networks with political and business leadership globally, facilitating policy advocacy and business development.
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