Wayland, MA, April 12, 2007 – Robert Frances Group (RFG), an international Information Technology consulting and research group and the Open Geospatial Consortium, Inc., have signed a Memorandum of Agreement to cooperate in promoting the use of geospatial technologies in business. The two organizations plan to leverage their strengths to enable organizations to better leverage and benefit from location information.
“RFG will enable us to better understand the language and needs of many communities that have location information, but are not yet fully exploiting it in their businesses,” Mark Reichardt, President of OGC said. “Our members have done a great job of providing the technology and RFG will help us tremendously to understand how to make the case to non-users.”
“Many executives are unaware of the possibilities available by exploiting location,” said Ron Exler, Vice President and Research Fellow at RFG who leads their location work. “As the cost of this exploitation falls, often as a result of standardization, more and more businesses will see the value and use the technology to enhance business performance.”
The RFG was founded to provide business advice to IT executives. It has published a number of research papers about the value of geospatial information in business. A selection of those papers and information about RFG can be found at: http://www.rfgonline.com/. Robert Frances Group (RFG) also provides actionable, timely advice, consulting, and research about the IT marketplace to Global 2000 executives.
With a focus on “the business of IT,” RFG helps IT executives maximize their effectiveness by helping them align IT efforts with corporate business strategies, drive revenue, improve productivity, and reduce IT costs. RFG accomplishes this by working closely and directly with clients to evaluate hardware and software acquisitions, help assess the impact of events, laws, and regulations, negotiate optimal contracts, and plan IT-empowered business strategies.
The OGC® is an international industry consortium of more than 335 companies, government agencies, research organizations, and universities participating in a consensus process to develop publicly available interface specifications. OpenGIS® Specifications support interoperable solutions that “geo-enable” the Web, wireless and location-based services, and mainstream IT. The specifications empower technology developers to make complex spatial information and services accessible and useful with all kinds of applications. Visit the OGC website at http://www.opengeospatial.org.
“