State of Karnataka, India, Selects ESRI

21 September 2009, 4:18am

Redlands, California—September 21, 2009—The state of Karnataka, located in the southern part of India, has been a pioneer in setting up a disaster-monitoring station through its Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre (KSNDMC). The center, which has been in operation since 1988, has recently selected ESRI software for building an advanced disaster management portal. NIIT GIS Limited (ESRI India). ESRI’s distributor in India, will provide software and implementation services. The enterprise system will enable KSNDMC to convert large volumes of data into a powerful spatial analysis and data dissemination system.

“The portal will provide real-time assessments for all types of disasters,” says Dr. V. S. Prakash, director of KSNDMC. “It is a sophisticated project. GIS software will be able to model disasters and provide alerts via the Web, short message service (SMS), and conventional maps and reports.”

ESRI’s ArcGIS Server will operate as the platform for the disaster management portal. It will enable efficient distribution of maps and GIS capabilities via Web mapping applications and services. The server-based architecture supplies data integration for both historical and real-time data feeds including weather station, earthquake seismograph, and basemap data. Customized ArcGIS modeling tools, combined with KSNDMC data models, will automatically analyze data and generate assessments for drought, floods, earthquakes, and other emergencies.

“This will reduce the time it takes to manually generate paper maps and send them out to people,” says Prakash. “We needed technology that could incorporate real-time measurements from a variety of instruments and observations. Our GIS-based portal will do that. The value will be fast access to information from a number of sources, dynamically updated and available to anyone who needs it.”

“We are honored to be selected by KSNDMC and are committed to helping it succeed,” says Dr. Mukund Rao, president and COO, NIIT GIS Limited. “ArcGIS Server will meet its needs by seamlessly integrating data, images, and spatial data. It will also integrate geoprocessing models as an application service that is available on demand.”

ESRI, Inc.

Geo: International