24 March 2014 – The Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC®) is pleased to announce that Ordnance Survey has raised its membership level from Technical Committee level to Principal level.
As a Principal Member, Ordnance Survey will participate in OGC's Planning Committee to explore market and technology trends relevant to OGC's mission to assure that OGC's policies and procedures remain effective and agile in a changing technology environment, and to participate in final approval decisions for all OGC standards.
“Ordnance Survey is a world renowned national mapping authority already internationally recognized as a leader in the adoption and consensus advancement of geospatial standards. The move to become a Principal level OGC member can only further enhance this recognition and leadership position,” said Mark Reichardt, President and CEO of the OGC.
This is an important development for Ordnance Survey, highlighting the national mapping authority's commitment, and ongoing support, to the development of international open standards. Ordnance Survey has been a long-term Technical Member of OGC taking a lead role on various geospatial standards projects including the development of CityGML and more recently the OGC Web Map Service (WMS) Interface Standard.
The new Principal Membership reinforces Ordnance Survey's vision to be at the forefront of developments in open standards development. Under the new membership Ordnance Survey will increase their engagement with the international geospatial community to ultimately improve the quality of standards globally and to enable the industry to continue to innovate and grow.
The new level of membership also aligns with the UK Government policy on using open standards and it is expected to create new opportunities for Ordnance Survey to further develop collaborations with Government by shaping standards that promote interoperability.
Peter ter Haar, Ordnance Survey Director of Products and Innovation, adds: “Ordnance Survey has an excellent working relationship with OGC and the new Principal Membership highlights our commitment to the development of open geospatial standards.
“We expect the new level of membership to deliver significant opportunities to Ordnance Survey, by firstly helping to future-proof systems and secondly by creating opportunities to develop commercial growth for Ordnance Survey and Ordnance Survey International.
“We look forward to building on our already good relationship with the OGC and are especially keen to lead on some of the emerging geospatial standards for mobile, 3D and linked data.”
About Ordnance Survey
Ordnance Survey is Great Britain's national mapping authority, providing the most accurate and up-to-date geographic data, relied on by government, business and individuals. For more information, visit www.ordnancesurvey.com.
About the OGC
The OGC is an international consortium of more than 470 companies, government agencies, research organizations, and universities participating in a consensus process to develop publicly available geospatial standards. OGC standards support interoperable solutions that “geo-enable” the Web, wireless and location based services, and mainstream IT. OGC standards empower technology developers to make geospatial information and services accessible and useful with any application that needs to be geospatially enabled. Visit the OGC website at http://www.opengeospatial.org/contact.
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