November 18, 2015

Bringing GIS to the Enterprise Table

The past few years have seen unprecedented technology advancements in the utility industry. With upgraded software applications, the proliferation of mobile devices, and an improvement in hardware in general, utilities are better positioned than ever before to increase efficiency through data sharing and collaboration.

That’s where the bottlenecks and the data silos come into play.

Multiple software packages mean multiple databases, and that means tracking down multiple sources when you need to gather your information. But imagine being able to go to one source – one visual source – that gathers data from all of your databases and parses the information into something usable and meaningful?

Make GIS an integral part of your enterprise approach and this is your new reality.

A Centralized Repository for Enterprise Data

Geospatial resources are at the heart of GIS, and they’re at the heart of your business. Ultimately, those physical assets out in the field, and every activity related to those assets, end up in your GIS database. With Futura Systems’ GIS suite, you can track assets, stake jobs, manage outages, plot new service lines – and all of that data is stored in your geodatabase.

Now imagine what you can do by connecting all of that geospatial information to your CIS data, work order information, vendor and plant resources, SCADA data, AMI data, or any other data source you have. You suddenly have an infinite number of ways to combine the information in those databases. By combining non-GIS information with GIS information, you broaden the scope of your system knowledge and expand the distributed capabilities of knowledge sharing across your organization.

A New Level of Collaboration

GIS maps are interactive. You can add layers of information, combine and sort data visually, and isolate all metadata for a specific task, project, or even customer. You simply cannot do this with spreadsheets and static reports. With an interactive analytics tool like Futura’s CatalystIQ, you are no longer hampered by one-dimensional data. You can connect your data sources in CatalystIQ, and then share the data with anyone in your organization without providing extensive training. Collaborative data sharing allows rapid decision making. Interactive, enterprisedata sharing allows agile decision making: interact with your data, change parameters on the fly, get a visual representation, and then add the map, and see where that can take you. Better information leads to better decisions. Better decisions lead to better operations. Better operations lead to a better, more efficient, more responsive organization.

When you’re thinking enterprise, make sure you’re bringing GIS to the table. And make sure your GIS provider is Futura Systems.

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