Tag: digital twins

Frankfurt welcomes INTERGEO 2025 as geospatial tech tackles global challenges

Geoinformation has evolved from a specialist tool to an essential resource for government, business and civilian use. Whether captured from space or drones, analyzed through artificial intelligence (AI) or 3D visualizations, geographic data now, more than ever, drives critical decisions across industries.

INTERGEO 2025 exemplifies this transformation. From Oct. 7-9, the Frankfurt Exhibition Center will host the world’s leading conference and trade show for geodesy, geoinformation and land management, featuring more than 500 international exhibitors ranging from innovative startups to industry giants.

Three-Day Conference Program Features 100 Sessions
The INTERGEO Conference will present approximately 100 presentations and sessions over three days, drawing speakers from space agencies, United Nations organizations, government ministries and international technology companies.

Key topics include AI-powered remote sensing, urban digital twins, open data strategies, Earth observation for climate and crisis management and building information modeling (BIM) integration for infrastructure lifecycle management.

Keynote presentations such as “Earth Observation and Artificial Intelligence” and “Cartography for the Future” will provide forward-looking insights, while panel discussions on digital sovereignty and standardization will address strategic frameworks. Each session demonstrates how geoinformation serves as the critical foundation for climate adaptation, disaster preparedness, urban development and infrastructure protection.

Opening Day Features Space Technology Focus

DVW President Prof. Rudolf Staiger will open INTERGEO on Tuesday, Oct. 7, followed by a keynote from Johann Dietrich Wörner, space coordinator for the state of Hesse. His presentation, “Earth Observation and Artificial Intelligence,” will explore how AI transforms massive Earth observation datasets into actionable insights for climate, agriculture and urban planning projects.

Prof. Serena Coetzee of UNU-FLORES will deliver the German Cartography Congress keynote on Wednesday, Oct. 8, addressing cartography’s evolution amid growing geodata volumes and governance challenges.

Thursday morning’s panel discussion, “Digital Transformation – Perspectives, Trends and Theses,” will examine the need for reorienting geoinformation management to foster innovation and collaboration.

Revolutionizing Geospatial Data Analysis

AI is accelerating the transformation of raw data into actionable insights, fundamentally changing how professionals work with geoinformation. The session “AI-Based Analysis of Remote Sensing Data for Updating the ATKIS Basic DLM” demonstrates practical applications in public administration.

The Hessian Administration for Soil Management and Geoinformation uses AI methods to automatically detect landscape changes, significantly improving the quality and timeliness of digital landscape models.

Urban digital twins are rapidly advancing from static models to powerful operational platforms. The session “From Data to Insights: Visualization Technologies for Next-Generation Digital Twins” will showcase how modern visualization makes complex systems accessible and accelerates planning processes.

The research project “DigitalCities4Us” illustrates practical applications, using high-resolution 3D data to enable barrier-free urban planning and improve accessibility for people with mobility restrictions.

Additional sessions will examine implementation across administrative levels. “The Digital Twin NRW: A Practical Report” presents a statewide geospatial data infrastructure that is freely accessible and continuously developed. The city of Zurich will demonstrate its transition from traditional geospatial data infrastructures to multifunctional twin platforms.

Geodata infrastructures, open data and data spaces form the backbone of digital transformation and serve as key prerequisites for digital sovereignty. Multiple sessions will emphasize the importance of stable, future-ready geodata infrastructure.

Standardization receives particular attention through presentations like “Three Perspectives, One Goal: Digital Sovereignty through Open Standards in BIM and GIS” and the position paper “Official Geodata as a Basis for Digital Processes in Planning, Construction and Operation.” These sessions demonstrate how uniform standards for data exchange between geographic information systems and building information modeling can accelerate planning, construction and operational processes.

The position paper represents a joint initiative of buildingSMART Germany, the Working Committee of the Surveying Authorities and the Federal Association of Publicly Appointed Surveyors.

Critical infrastructures require precise, reliable data to minimize risks. The presentation “Regional and Effective Flood Protection in the State Capital of Düsseldorf” demonstrates how geoportals and flood forecasting tools prevent flooding and strengthen urban infrastructure resilience.

Bringing Innovation to the Exhibition Floor

Registration is now open at the INTERGEO website. The INTERGEO 2025 team looks forward to welcoming attendees to the Frankfurt Exhibition Center from Oct. 7-9.

September 25, 2025
XenomatiX: Roadway assessment with solid-state lidar

Multi-sensor clusters enable precise assessment of road conditions. (Photo: XenomatiX)

The success of higher levels of vehicular autonomy will depend on two types of roadway corridor digital twins: pre-mapped and augmented on the fly. No matter how well the corridors are pre-mapped, there will always be the need for the vehicle to be self-aware — not only of the proximity of other vehicles and pedestrians, but also of changes to fixed features. New vehicles are being provisioned with multi-sensor clusters, including GNSS, cameras, lidar, sonic and more. This provides an opportunity to more precisely assess the condition of the road surface, which affects the performance of vehicle suspension systems, tires, fuel efficiency and general wear and tear.

“Imagine that your car navigation map system included roadway conditions,” said Karsten Bronowski, sales and business development manager for XenomatiX, “a global view where roads are color-coded based on their surface types and roughness. And all of this is mapped by systems like ours or added to the mobile systems mapping all the roads.

“Our product actually came out of the automotive world, and we still have customers that use it as a reference system for active suspensions, for mass-spring damping systems,” Bronowski said. For these applications, the sensors were mounted facing forward for a preview mode. “We have worked with the Belgian Road Research Center and others with applications to readily provide the international roughness index.”

XenomatiX was formed in 2013, focused on developing true solid-state lidar. “The idea was to get the motor out of lidar,” said Bronowski. “You have moving parts, you have wear and tear, the effects of vibration, problems with long-term reliability and with controlling temperature. With true solid-state lidar, you eliminate these issues.” Micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) lidar systems still have moving, opto-mechanical components. Bronowski said that the solid-state systems feature a CMOS-based detector generating high-density point clouds in all weather conditions, and a multi-beam laser projector generating a high-resolution grid of points.

The dual lidar sensor system gets its orientation and positioning from additional components, including GNSS and IMU. The system that Bronowski showed at Intergeo 2022 had Septentrio AsteRx-U3 GNSS/IMU units supporting dual antennas for heading. However, they are using other means to improve both relative and absolute positioning: “How we do this is one of our secrets. For one of our customers in Japan mapping local highways, we proved to have excellent compensation, even tracking precisely through a 4-kilometer-long tunnel.”

XenomatiX has developed software to analyze data for many applications, automate feature recognition, and even validate other data. For instance, one customer in the United States is a big player in the satellite imaging sector that wants to match that data with pavement markings the XenomatiX system picks up.

While there is a needed calibration step and the requirement to align the detector for the dedicated measurement vehicle, sensor systems such as this can be put on just about any type of vehicle — on- or off-road. The driver does not need to intervene much, and the processing is done on a standard PC or laptop. “The customer does not care about the systems, just the data that comes from it,” Bronowski said.

December 28, 2022
Info360.com provides digital twins for water industry

Photo: tuachanwatthana/iStock/Getty Images Plus/Getty Images

Release follows $1 billion Innovyze acquisition announcement by Autodesk

Water infrastructure software company Innovyze has released Info360.com, a cloud-based, artificial intelligence-powered platform for real-world water lifecycle management.

Combined with Info360 Insight, a data visualization and workflow solution, the platform enables dynamic digital twins for the water industry.

Dynamic Digital Twins are virtual models of real-world assets and systems that can learn and adapt to changing circumstances. Built upon Amazon Web Services (AWS), Info360.com is uniquely designed to support Dynamic Digital Twins by gathering and unifying asset information, connecting live and historic performance data to Innovyze as well as third-party applications.

Autodesk Inc. announced March 1 it signed a definitive agreement to acquire Portland, Oregon-based Innovyze for $1 billion net of cash subject to working capital and tax closing adjustments. Autodesk’s digital-twin strategy creates a clearer path to a more sustainable and digitized water industry, the company said.

This context-aware platform can predict future performance using synchronized computational models that become more intelligent as they’re used. Info360.com provides recommended best-case actions that can help water utilities maintain the highest levels of service, capacity and efficiency.

Due to water system complexity and static operating budgets, many water utilities have struggled to adopt the digital transformation technologies that would allow them to improve predictability and performance. Using the power of the cloud, Info360.com is financially and operationally more accessible, powerful and flexible than traditional on-premise systems.

“The complex, physical properties of water and massive, underground infrastructure that must be monitored and managed make digitization extremely challenging for water utilities,” said Colby Manwaring, Chief Executive Officer at Innovyze. “We’ve combined 35 years of expertise in water management with the power of the cloud to bridge the data and technology gaps that have kept water utilities from truly capitalizing on Digital Twins with our new Info360.com platform. This is a game-changer in making digital transformation achievable for water utilities of any size.”

The new Info360 Insight SaaS application provides utilities with customizable dashboards and KPIs that track and visualize the real-time performance of the entire water distribution system. Performance data can be used and analyzed for daily operations, such as pipe break detection and water loss. The same data can also be used to plan for future maintenance and capacity fluctuations, with seamless integration into the hydraulic model.

“Info360 Insight is the first of several SaaS applications we’re delivering for the Info360.com platform, all offering advantages to utilities like easy onboarding, infinite scalability, and rigorous security out of the box,” said Rick Gruenhagen, CTO at Innovyze. “Better yet, the Info360 platform architecture incorporates cutting-edge technologies like predictive analytics and artificial intelligence tuned specifically for the water lifecycle, allowing utilities of all sizes to stay at the forefront of innovation without the need to maintain complex software or hire hordes of IT experts. As a result, utilities will have the technology foundation they need to deliver the highest possible service at the lowest possible cost.”

Info360 Insight provides real-time ingestion and analysis of SCADA data, along with 24/7 event monitoring, enabling utilities to detect incidents within their infrastructure. The system can check multiple resolution scenarios and apply recommended actions to resolve the failure as quickly as possible — ensuring a higher level of service and reliability.

March 17, 2021