Azavea wins $150k NSF grant to develop GIS speed processors

In a world in which technology is being chased into the clouds, Azavea‘s calling card is still local.

The geospatial analysis work from the Callowhill software development firm formerly known as Avencia requires so much time, memory and processing power that its application are tied to workstations, despite trends in recent years for companies to become more web based.

So Azavea and its founder Robert Cheetham are working for a change that could impact the field and its implications for geolocation, mapping and the like. Armed with a $150,000 National Science Foundation grant, Azavea will begin testing the feasibility of using graphics processing units, a type of specialized processor more often implemented for rendering complex video game graphics at increasing rates. The aim will be to substantially increase the performance of many GIS software operations.

That means the development and implementation of projects that rely on GIS functions can be improved, like its noted Walkshed project.

Read more about the company’s grant here.

Azavea submits BusMinder for Massachusetts Department of Transportation contest

BusMinder, a bid from Azavea for a contest from the Massachusetts Department of Transportation.

The story of a government looking for technology to do what it does better is becoming increasingly average.

And Callowhill-based GIS software firm Azavea, which recently changed its name from Avencia, has made it something of a habit of getting involved whether those discussions are happening in Philadelphia or not.

More than a month after chasing New York City’s BigApps contest, an Azavea developer has his eyes set on winning a challenge from the Massachusetts Department of Transportation.

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Azavea debuts free subscription plan for legislative district, elected official search API

Fresh off a name change, GIS software firm Azavea, formerly Avencia, has launched a free subscription plan for Cicero, its much-touted legislative district and elected official search API.

The plan offers users 1,000 monthly credits toward “any coordinate-based legislative district matching, elected official data lookups and/or map web service requests,” according to a release [PDF].

The company release leans heavily on suggesting the ‘Cicero Free‘ plan is for more limited organizations that want to add legislative data to their Web sites or online applications. The recently released Our Philadelphia platform, which was built by Common Cause Pennsylvania to track money in local politics, used a beta version of the free plan.

Play with it the free API here.

Avencia becomes Azavea, relents on trademark dispute, to launch redesigned site

Update: Technically Philly has received additional information about the reasons behind the name change and is seeking to clarify the confusion.

Robert Cheetham doesn’t want to change his name.

The founder of Avencia doesn’t want to be forced to develop a new brand for his Callowhill-headquartered GIS software firm.

“Avencia will now be known as Azavea – pronounced like “azalea”. There is no particularly good reason for this, and this was not a change that we sought,” Cheetham says. “We liked our name just fine.”

But the change has come just the same, the result of giving into the financial pressures of a three-years-old trademark dispute.

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State makes moves after NTIA awards $2.2 million for broadband maps, plans

Rendell was quite prepared for $2.2 million in federal broadband research and planning funds that we reported Thursday.

A spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development tells Technically Philly that the state is already in negotiations with a yet undisclosed vendor to handle the job.

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