Nearmap expands aerial imaging market presence with New Zealand...

Nearmap expands aerial imaging market presence with New Zealand operations

Aerial imaging company Nearmap (ASX: NEA) has completed its move into the New Zealand market by announcing that it has now established business operations including the commencement of sales, marketing and product resources functions, effective immediately.

Nearmap says it has been undergoing a pilot program in the country for some time in preparation for an official launch that includes significant investment, additional operations and continual product development specifically tailored for the New Zealand market.

Some of its product features include providing users with the ability to tap into richly-detailed aerial imagery to conduct virtual site visits and location analysis.

More broadly, Nearmap provides geospatial mapping technology, delivering high-resolution aerial imagery as a service to businesses across the world. Its company motto is: “We change the way people view the world, so they can profoundly change the way they work.”

Using its own patented camera systems and processing software, Nearmap captures wide-scale urban areas in Australia, New Zealand, and the US multiple times every year, to ensure updated content is instantly available in the cloud via its proprietary web application or served to customers via API integration.

With its Kiwi expansion now done, there is even talk of the company entering a “third geography” in the foreseeable future, according to its current CEO Rob Newman.

As an attempt to demonstrate and validate the effectiveness of its New Zealand-focused product for the geospatial community in the country, Nearmap says it will exhibit at the Esri Users Conference at the SKYCITY Auckland Convention Centre next weekend (20-22 August 2018).

The Aussie company says it intends to “accelerate the significant growth opportunity that exists in New Zealand” with Nearmap adding that its mapping operations in the country are already 72% completed. The content obtained and produced by Nearmap has already been provided to several Australian subscribers with significant operations in New Zealand and includes various industries such as local government, solar and architecture and engineering (ACE) firms.

A further checkpoint likely to provide fresh light on the company’s present performance will be Nearmap’s full-year results, due to be published on 22 August 2018.

From Australia to New Zealand and beyond

According to Nearmap, its Kiwi launch means it can provide subscriptions specifically for the needs of Kiwi businesses, with an initial range of tools and data specific to the country remaining in perpetual development for recurring customers.

“Following the success of our initial pilot program selling to Australian customers with operations in New Zealand, we have also seen significant interest from New Zealand businesses,” said Shane Preston, executive vice president of sales for Nearmap.

“Responding to this demand, we have now launched a dedicated product, billed in NZ dollars with tools specific to New Zealand users. This is being combined with a dedicated sales, marketing and support effort for our New Zealand customers,” he added.

“With the compelling nature of Nearmap’s content and product now evident to the New Zealand market, this launch allows us to accelerate our penetration of that market. It further enhances our position at the forefront of the global location intelligence market,” said Dr Rob Newman, CEO and managing director of Nearmap.

“The relative ease with which we have been able to add New Zealand to our capture portfolio and generate ACV demonstrates the scalability and cost efficiency of our business model. As we are now capturing areas of New Zealand multiple times, at consistently high resolution, this also opens up opportunities in machine learning and artificial intelligence in a third geography,” said Dr Newman.