Oracle and MapInfo will integrate MapInfo's suite of web-based spatial and mapping products with Oracle8i, the industry's only Internet database and Oracle Spatial, which provides the capability to manage and analyse geographic data in Oracle8i.

Alan Ellis, Managing Director of Spatial Technologies, local MapInfo distributor says, "This technology integration enables new ways for organisations to see and analyse data in their electronic commerce, data warehousing, customer care and call centre applications. The Oracle and MapInfo combination has taken geographic and demographic information beyond their traditional use in geographic information systems (GIS) into data warehouse, enterprise resource planning (ERP) and customer relationship management (CRM) applications. For example, telecommunications companies are now able to provide better service and more accurately targeted marketing campaigns by understanding the relationship between customer location and the coverage and services provided by their networks.

"For organisations like British Telecom (BT), with vast physical and information infrastructures, accurate, up-to-date spatial information is critical," said Ian Drury, GIS Consultant, BT. "MapInfo's relationship with Oracle on next generation web-based spatial information solutions is welcome as it will allow organisations like ours to provide seamless access to vital spatial information to greater numbers of users easily and quickly".

MapInfo also now resells Oracle8i and Oracle Spatial and Oracle has licensed MapInfo's projection-management technology for future versions of Oracle Spatial. In addition to the new products and cooperative marketing activities this alliance has yielded, Oracle has established a consulting practice to deploy and deliver solutions based on the combined technology.

"The market for cross-industry and vertical-specific CRM analytic applications will reach $1 billion by 2002," said Henry Morris, VP for data warehousing and information access at International Data Corporation. "Spatial information can make an important contribution when accessed along with other customer information to better predict how customers will act. The combination of an Oracle spatial information management platform with MapInfo software and data is well positioned to capitalise on this new opportunity".

The MapInfo/Oracle partnership has already delivered its first major successful solution. MapInfo has signed a contract with Nextel Communications for approximately $2 million to deliver a suite of Java-based MapInfo products and data on Oracle8i. Nextel, the leading provider of fully-integrated wireless communication services, is the first telecommunications company to select the new Java-based Spatial Internet Solution developed by MapInfo and Oracle to manage and analyse critical geographic data using Oracle8i, Oracle Spatial and Oracle8i JServer.

Under the contract, Nextel will deploy an integrated suite of MapInfo's 100% pure Java server technology and related client software and data products. The solution will be implemented and payments scheduled to be made, over a ten-month period. "Nextel relies heavily on its intranet and web-enabled OSS and we are looking forward to integrating MapInfo's powerful enterprise-wide spatial solution," said Barry West, Nextel's Chief Technology Officer. "With their software and service support, we can achieve our network planning objectives.

"This major contract with Nextel is validation that companies in highly-competitive service industries, such as telecommunications, see real value in the new MapInfo/Oracle partnership announced just two months ago," said John Cavalier, MapInfo's CEO and President. "It also demonstrates our ability to secure large-scale contracts with key customers in the telecommunications industry, MapInfo's principal vertical market."

MapInfo/Oracle Spatial Internet solution on Oracle8i

The Spatial Internet solution is one of the first complete, nonproprietary, pure Java spatial solutions for the Internet. It provides everything a customer needs to deploy a web-enabled, location-based spatial application via Oracle8i. Engineered to be a tightly integrated solution, the Spatial Internet Solution includes Oracle8i, Oracle Spatial and MapInfo client and server-based software (MapXtreme, MapX, MapInfo Professional), MapInfo Commercial Data and geocoding products. '

Spatial Technologies

(011) 807 3807

alane@spatial.co.za