Michael Dixon, Chief Data Officer, Geoscape Australia
In our annual Leaders Forum, we ask experts to look ahead into 2023. Here we talk collaboration with Michael Dixon.
Michael Dixon has more than 20 years’ hands-on experience in the geospatial industry, where he has led both technical and commercial teams. He has a deep connection to national foundational geospatial datasets and related services.
Is the geospatial sector in good shape to help solve the needs of the nation, e.g. climate change, renewable energy, infrastructure projects?
COVID-19 has accelerated the rise of the data age and the push for digital transformation within our economy. This has resulted in an enormous amount of data being generated that can be leveraged to solve many problems at an economic and societal level. However, there is still a need to work together efficiently as an industry. Currently, a lot of duplication is happening across the geospatial sector with organisations building similar capabilities. Whilst we acknowledge that competition drives efficiency and innovation and provides consumers with more choices, I think you can make a strong argument that the industry has the technical acumen to respond to these challenges, but coordinating and aligning our capability still needs some work.
What are the most important challenges facing the sector?
It goes back to the coordination and looking to minimise or even remove the duplication of effort. We should be considering new models across the industry that incentivise organisations to build on capabilities rather than seeking to reinvent them with every new project.
In our own space, there is widespread acknowledgement that foundational data helps businesses make better decisions. It’s relevant at every level of the government and across numerous industry verticals, including insurance, retail, finance and logistics. Whilst foundational data is available through various platforms and portals, there is a gap in ensuring the data is curated, tailored for the industry use case and delivered in a way that enables the customer to quickly obtain the value. Now imagine each organisation going through a procurement exercise, developing the vocabulary to talk with a supplier, assessing if the data is fit for purpose, making a final selection and then moving into implementation. Then layer on the need for software and perhaps engineering and analytical resources, a cloud host, a mobile solution, a real-time dashboard and more.
Which technologies or innovations are going to make their mark in 2023?
If I knew that I’d already be retired, but that said, the innovations that I am keeping a closer eye on revolve around improving the connectedness across data. There are pockets of success, e.g. BIM data is present in wide-scale digital twins, with the innovation being a combination of identifying the incentives for organisations to share more project-based data, coupled with creating data pipelines to curate data. A BIM can be quite complex and include sensitive information, yet all of this detail is not required or even practical for sharing across traditional GIS or digital twin applications.
What’s on your wish list for 2023?
The Data Availability and Transparency Act 2022 delivers a new framework for access to Australian Government data; however, I wish for additional consideration for how the industry will be able to benefit. The corollary is that the industry has developed a range of data and capabilities that could be deployed across adjacent industry verticals and government.
There is considerable overlap between the needs of government and industry when it comes to data and so my further wish is a mutual benefit obtainable through improved collaboration. I’m confident that the business case will ‘stack up’ for capability that enhances collaboration across the sector.
What are your customers and collaborators looking for in 2023?
Confidence to broaden and deepen their investment in the sector. At the moment, I’d say we are just halfway in terms of how much value we can offer businesses, government and the broader economy. It’s already well recognised that our capability can help improve efficiency, resilience and engagement, but does anyone think we are doing as much as we could? Also, improving the accessibility of curated data and location-capable software, investing in standards and integrating further into mainstream IT will be essential for the sector to realise its full potential.
This article was first published in Issue 116 (Dec/Jan 2022-23) of Position magazine.
Stay up to date by getting stories like this delivered to your inbox.
Sign up to receive our free weekly Spatial Source newsletter.
