This is a “One Small Step for Man” and “One Giant Leap for Mankind” sort of moment.
Although NZ is small compare to AUS, nevertheless, we are now shown the steps in how Nearmap will “cookie cut” all new geographical expansions:
1) From am established customer base, gauge the interest in going into a new country.
2) Once enough interests are found and the economics are evaluated then fly & capture the initiate images in the new country.
3) Make the newly captured images available to existing customers that drove the demand and make an immediate revenue increase.
4) As time passes (for NZ, this only took a little more than a year) and enough interests are generated then setup a dedicated sales, marketing, & product resource teams to operate in the new country.
With today’s announcement, these steps have obviously worked for the AUS->NZ expansion and I believe growing from:
US -> Canada
US -> Mexico
will be very similar.
In my mind, there is no doubt that Canada & Mexico will be next, the BIG question is, as their HUGE US customer base continues to grow and Nearmap manages to gather enough interestes to expand into BOTH Canada & Mexico, will these 2 significant geographical expansions occur at the SAME time? My reasoning is, if their huge US customer base demands it and the economics to expand into both countries simultaneously stacks up then WHY NOT? But if a simultaneous expansion does occur then I believe we might possibly see this within 3 years (ie around 2021).
So yeah.... today is a “One Small Step for Man” and “One Giant Leap for Mankind” moment for Nearmap.
NEA Price at posting:
$1.44 Sentiment: Buy Disclosure: Held