I am happy to announce two new members of ICA.
Trinidad & Tobago has decided to join ICA as national member. The Ministry of Land and Marine Resources Division on Survey and Mapping based in El Soccoro, Trinidad and Tobago has the mission on “contributing to the development and economic success of Trinidad and Tobago by adopting new technologies and by providing up-to-date and authoritative maps, charts, land and sea information, in conventional paper and progressively in digital form to meet the needs of the government, the general public and the private sector” and felt that a full national membership with ICA will be a benefit for being able to follow this mission up.
My specific thank goes to Mrs. Paula Drakes from the Land Settlement Agency of the Ministry of Land and Marine Resources of Trinidad and Tobago. She has participated in the successful ICA Workshop on OpenSource Technologies and WebMapping early in the year 2014 at Sint-Maarten and has since then followed the idea of full cooperation up.
A heartly welcome to Trindidad & Tobago!
HERE Europe B.V. has decided to join ICA as affiliate member! HERE belonged to Nokia and was recently sold to a consortium of Audi, BMW, and Daimler. HERE considers itself a global leader in the mapping and location intelligence business. Rooted in almost three decades of experience in cartography, their vision is to offer the world’s best maps and location experiences across multiple screens and operating systems. HERE is working on the idea, that giving people a better and deeper sense of location will be essential to live a modern urbanized life. Map products of HERE can be found in the majority of current navigation systems as well as in mobile, web and enterprise solutions of companies like BMW, Garmin, Toyota, Yahoo and many more.
It is for sure a win-win situation, if such a big and strong mapping company, aiming for producing the “world’s best maps”, and the international network of the International Cartographic Association meet and work together.
My specific thanks goes to Mrs. Astrid Dawson from HERE. She has participated at the ICC 2009 in Santiago de Chile and since then stayed in close contact with ICA, although she was promoted with Nokia and later HERE to responsible positions.